Soft machines I

History of technology is about how to increase precision and miniaturisation. When we talk about nanotechnology is ease to let our mind fly and think about little nanobots fixing our body from the inside. But is this what the future has for us? Let’s take a closer look.

Physics change at the nanoscale. Classical concepts of engineering change.Things like the viscosity of the water, how do we stick things together, Brownian motion and biocompatibility enter in game. We also must take the step between nanoscience and nanotechnology. The scalability and economical viability of the process is critical when we are talking about industrial process. So where are the nanomachines?

Is there any nanomachine working today? The answer is yes. Cell biology is full of them and we must look at the efficiency of the biology at the nanoscale. We should copy nature because of its optimal efficiency in biology nanotechnology, biological designs… and we must be aware that it will be hard to do better nature itself!

But, why is biological nanotechnology so efficient? Design principles are quite different from macro engineering and biology exploits the principles of the nanoscales. In the next post we will see how nanotechnology can mimic nature to use these principles.