From Nanotech to Zettatech
In a paper for the Royal Society's Working Group on Nanotechnology, Eric Drexler discusses the confusion surrounding the word 'nanotechnology' and suggests a clarifying addition to terminology in the field.
Eric Drexler writes:
From Nanotech to Zettatech
Dr. K. Eric Drexler
Chairman, Foresight InstituteExcerpted from a background paper provided to the Royal Society's Working Group on nanotechnology in preparation for an oral evidence session, 29 October 2003.
What is meant by "nanotechnology"?
Confusion around divergent uses of this term have spawned much of the confusion around the subject. The term was used by an author in Japan in the early 1970s to describe, among other things, precision glass polishing. It came into wide use and gained an aura of excitement after 1986, when I used it to label the Feynman vision of nanomachines building products with atomic precision. Over the next decade and a half, it has increasingly been used to re-label a diverse and often little-related collection of research efforts involving small parts or particles, embracing microlithography, fine particles, chemistry, thin fibers, and so forth.
It was the Feynman vision and its consequences that gave "nanotechnology" its reputation as a revolutionary technology with enormous promise and dangers, but it is current research that gives a different sort of "nanotechnology" a reputation as something happening right now. Confusion between these meanings — and the natural urge of numerous researchers to dissociate their current work from promises and dangers that they neither understand nor plan to deliver — has generated much heat. Since some current research is, in fact (largely unintentionally) developing the capabilities needed for implementing the Feynman vision, the two meanings of "nanotechnology" do have some relationship. Further, although the research community has settled on the inclusive, current-technology meaning for the term, the chief fears and concerns articulated by the public stem from the previously established meaning of "nanotechnology" as a label for molecular manufacturing and its products.
Moving from history and analysis to prescription, how should "nanotechnology" be used? The natural course would be to follow general usage, which applies the term to any technology with significant nanoscale features. This has the advantage that recent computer chips, for example, are now "nanotechnology", making broad, simplistic fears absurd.
This leaves the problem of how to describe and distinguish the Feynman vision from this diffuse field. I have since the early 1990s used the term "molecular manufacturing" to describe the core enabling technology of the Feynman vision (large-scale mechanosynthesis based on positional control of chemically reactive molecules). Since the emphasis is on large-scale atomic precision, it is natural to seek a name that refers not to the nanometer scale of the parts, but to the number of distinct, designed parts in a macroscopic product, typically on the rough order of a sextillion (1021). Since the prefix "zetta-" denotes this number, the term "zettatechnology" naturally describes molecular manufacturing and its products (for comparison, the total world output of transistors has not yet reached one sextillion). One can thus speak of advanced nanotechnologies as eventually enabling zettatechnology, through further development of basic techniques followed by a major systems engineering effort. This clearly separates the concepts by providing distinct, contrasting labels.
Regardless of the choice of terms, it is crucial to recognize the confusion described above, including its effects on both press accounts and the response of lab scientists to the longer-term vision. Allaying false fears (and false denials of fears) begins with drawing the correct distinctions.
October 29th, 2003 at 8:53 PM
In the meantime…
… those of us who are trying to design just one atomically precise gear at a time might call what we're doing, "nanomechanical engineering".
Josh
October 30th, 2003 at 9:33 AM
an armchair anthropologists view of NanoTerminolog
Most likely we will look back in a thousand years and wonder why we even cared what it was called. Then, any name we pick will seem impossibly absurd anyway. Like the word scissors or the word paper. I believe it was Mr. Drexler who asserted that if atomically precise manufacturing is physically possible, it is also then a statistical inevitability. The only speed bump we see at the moment is the lack of applied mind hours, excluding of course extinction. From a birds eye view, just about every area of applied research going on in the world right now will help enable nanotechnology in the most revolutionary sense of the word. Introducing another term seems a waste of precious mind hours. Instead we should try to develop an algorithm that could develop an algorithm that could model how a particular term comes into general usage in the vast collective psyche of a planetary society. AhÖ never mind. We probably wouldn't be able to understand the output any way.
October 30th, 2003 at 10:13 AM
Mind Space
It will make an uphill battle even more uphill.
Changing the terminology at this point in time will cause the perception that the new users of the term "nanotechnology" are more accurate, more precise, and more "right", than the old users of the term, and further: that the major issues concerning the Old Guard are largely irrelevant in the light of the "revolution" that has occurred.
This goober from the peanut gallery has spoken.
Keep the terminology, keep the turf, stay the course. Not only were "we" here first, but we usually do know better; knock wood….
If a clarification is needed, then the term "assemblers" works fine to point out the manufacturing specific implications of nanotechnology.
October 30th, 2003 at 12:46 PM
Zettatechnology
I don't like it. People might think it was an excercise technology invented by a popular actor (C. Zeta-Jones). I prefer the current terms such as Molecular Manufacturing or Molecular Nanotechnology. Perhaps a clarification such as adding the name Feynman would be useful so one could speak of Feynman Molecular Nanotechnology or Feynman Molecular Engineering. Or perhaps just Feynman/Drexler Nanotechnology would work. That I like.
November 1st, 2003 at 12:13 PM
Re:Zettatechnology
Why then stop at zetta- ? If we count all the bits that can be in a hand-held computer, we could have about Avogadro's number of bits, and name it yottatechnology. Now that's a yotta-bits!
November 1st, 2003 at 12:41 PM
Yoctotechnology
Shouldn't we be keeping the idea of really
small, rather than switching to really large?
We can get really small numbers, if we refer to
volume rather than length. Technology based on
yoctoliters (cubic nanometers) can be called
yoctotechnology.
———————————————–
- Yuk! — Oh, Technology! —- Ned Ludd
November 1st, 2003 at 4:14 PM
Re:Zettatechnology
Educating the masses to nanotechnologies is the key, we need to have a well informed public to this emerging technology. It is our job to correct the miss understanding. On the lighter side. Somewhat like the Linux GNU/Linux issue, sorta, kinda. But back to the subject at hand. Drexleristic Nanotechology or any Drexler/Feynman combination of prefixs should work. Just go googing for zetatech or zetatechology, or zetatechnologies see what others are using zetatech* for. Interesting returns. Lastly, most should remember from Shakespeare: What's in a name? A rose by any other name would smell as sweet. The depending on your perspective/persuasion nanotechnology has a certain meaning. Its the layman or neophytes that will need to sort through the forest of meanings and terms. But this is true of most fields. Lets provide the information to the press and other information sources of the true nature of nanotechologies and correct them via email, etc when they are wrong. drT
November 3rd, 2003 at 5:35 AM
nano vs. zetta
1. I'm afraid another new term will make confusion only greater. 2. Zetetatochnology just don't come out right easily, nanotech does.
November 4th, 2003 at 4:38 AM
Re:Zettatechnology
I agree, adding another term now would only confuse the issue more. Remember when the ETC coined (Rubs eyes and sighs ruefully.) "atomotechnology?"
Think of many of the more established forms of technology, nuclear energy, for example. Despite nearly sixty years of education, public misperceptions about nuclear energy still haven't been cleared away. It's sad to say, but there is no quick fix for Foresight to enlighten the public with. Please remember, that to this day, people still believe in and waste money on astrology, flying saucers, creationism, medical quackery and so on.
Foresight, the CRN and other like-minded organizations must accept a largely thankless future of endless vigilance, endless advice and lobbying of political functionaries and endless corrections, repudiations and clarifications.
There is cause for hope however, despite all this muddleheaded thinking in the public, novel technologies still get researched, still get adopted and are still advanced.
November 4th, 2003 at 5:24 AM
Functional classification, not by size
The general idea of giving people a few more pigeon holes for these concepts is good and helpful — language shapes our thoughts, etc., in more ways than one.
However, tying a label to a specific number of components is not good, because it's exclusionary along a dimension that is not relevant. There are no natural boundaries before or after the 10^21 mark.
A better approach would be classification along functional lines, with a range of pigeon holes for passive nanoscale materials with various degrees of structuring down at the simpler end of the spectrum, and gradual change along various dimensions further out. A certain amount of overlap really doesn't matter. Don't bother with fancy labels either, just scatter the letters of the alphabet arbitrarily across the pigeon holes, possibly with a subindex, again arbitrary. Referring to an item as "B3 nanotech" is no more complex than referring to a sun as a type G2 star, it seems to work pretty well for everyone. Indeed, the lack of any a prior meaning of a label may be an asset.
November 4th, 2003 at 6:37 AM
Scalable nanotech products
There is another reason why tying labels to physical size or to number of component parts is not helpful: there is no reason to doubt that many products of wider nanotechnology are going to be scalable across many orders of magnitude, so pigeon holes need to be flexible enough to accomodate this.
At certain dimensions, the forces that give objects their physical properties place a limit on scalability, but in the opposite direction the room for growth is usually immense. It would help no one if objects manufactured with atomic precision sudddenly lost their previous classification because they were scaled up for a larger application, nor if clever design allows their function to be implemented with far fewer components than before.
As an example, a nanotube is a nanotube, regardless of whether it contains 10^21 atoms or just a few thousand. Placing it in a pigeon hole with other atomically-precise objects of related symmetries would be quite helpful, whereas applying a size-related tag is actually unhelpful in this context.
Scaling of the products of nanotechnology will be a topic of major interest in the decades and centuries ahead. We need a scheme of classification that does not unravel as designs scale up or down. Structural and functional methods of classification would both be more useful than one based on size or number of components.
November 4th, 2003 at 1:24 PM
Eric, please give credit where credit is due
Eric, no matter how much it galls you, you need to grit your teeth and honor the man who invented the term "nanotechnology."
The credit goes to Norio Taniguchi. The year was 1974. And his definition is as follows:
"ëNano-technologyí mainly consists of the processing of separation, consolidation, and
deformation of materials by one atom or one molecule."
Taniguchi's definition subsumes your "zettatech." Why not just openly admit it and move on?
November 5th, 2003 at 11:03 AM
From Nano to Zetta
Maybe it would make a good poll.
What should we call "it"?
November 5th, 2003 at 12:09 PM
Re:Eric, please give credit where credit is due
There is no issue here and this has been debated here before. Taniguchi coined the term in reference to precision manufacturing of silicon in the 100nm range with no though of the kind of molecular engineering Drexler had in mind. Drexler quite appropriately applied the term and it is in that context that the word had been widely used. Don't confuse the word and who coined it with the concept and who formed it.
November 5th, 2003 at 12:32 PM
Re:From Nano to Zetta
Hmmm. I can't decide between "molecular nanotechnology" or "nanomechanical engineering." These terms are already in the literature, yet have not yet been so heavily used as to be meaningless.
Desktop fabrication could be confused with those CAM systems that sculpt prototypes out of plastic with laser light, "three dimensional printers."
Molecular manufacturing could be confused with ordinary molecular biology. This forces us to say such mouthfuls as "emergent molecular manufacturing" to refer to what ribosomes do versus "novel molecular manufacturing" to refer to assemblers and nanofactories that we build.
Assembler production states the goal clearly enough but "assembler" is a very vague term forcing the one who cites the phrase to constantly explain what an assembler is. Perhaps some would see that as a good thing.
I've already stated that I dislike introducing still more new terms like "zettatechnology."
In the end, I guess I like "nanomechanical engineering" best because it forces the user to bring the idea of mechanosynthesis in and it doesn't force the definition of new terms when all we want is to steer away from the blurring of commonly used terms. From what I've read so far, mechanosynthesis seems to be clearly distinguished from directed chemical evolution, self-assembly, cluster chemistry or colloidal chemistry although it could include those if needed.
November 6th, 2003 at 2:11 AM
Memology, or engineering classification?
Two quite separate issues are being addressed here. On the one hand there is a desire to improve the overall meme-space labelling so that both popular and technical discourse can become a little less ambiguous than at present. On the other hand, there is also a desire to transform the current rather unproductive jockeying for elbow room among research groups into scientific collaboration. As Eric puts it, "the natural urge of numerous researchers to dissociate their current work from promises and dangers that they neither understand nor plan to deliver" is not helpful. Both issues are important. Both need to be addressed, but you have to understand your goals to be able to deliver on them.
Adding one or two labels to the current meme-space might help authors write slightly more useful articles, but it will do little to remedy the malaise in the scientific community. What is needed there is a scientific or engineering basis for distinguishing between different aspects of research into nanoscale technologies. Furthermore, given a classification scheme that is not impossibly obscure, the simpler problem of popular meme-space labelling will probably sort itself out automatically.
Like all epic voyages, the road starts with a single step. Bring together one or two people from each of the physics, materials, chemistry, medicine and biology sides of nanoscale research (and any other). Big names are not important, but deep understanding and a desire for collaboration are essential. Surround the room with whiteboards, get everyone to map out relevant areas of study within their domains, collapse any areas of full overlap, and finally assign arbitrary labels to each individual area and provide a verbose description for it. Do not assign short descriptive names for them, because these will become reasons for argument and discord; they are not necessary for technical progress anyway, given a reference label and a description.
The above would create a draft taxonomy of nanoscale research, but more importantly, it would also provide a dovetailing framework for scientific collaboration, while at the same time drawing clear boundaries between separate areas of interest and research. And that's exactly what we need here.
November 6th, 2003 at 2:25 AM
Re:From Nano to Zetta
We need a short name for the overall technology vision, one that describes nanoscale parts, macroscale systems, and both molecular manufacturing and its products. That name had been "nanotechnology", but it doesn't convey the meaning anymore. Any new term may be temporarily confusing, but isn't calling future diamondoid spacecraft technology by the same name as last year's sunscreen nanoparticles permanently confusing?
November 6th, 2003 at 11:24 AM
Re:Eric, please give credit where credit is due
C'mon, Rob, get real.
Eric freely gives credit to Feynman for forming the concepts of molecular engineering, including building molecules via physics rather than chemistry. A difference between Eric and Feynman was that Feynman thought this approach was futile:
"Ultimately, we can do chemical synthesis. A chemist comes to us and says,“Look, I want a molecule that has the atoms arranged thus and so; make me that molecule.'' The chemist does a mysterious thing when he wants to make a molecule. He sees that it has got that ring, so he mixes this and that, and he shakes it, and he fiddles around. And, at the end of a difficult process, he usually does succeed in synthesizing what he wants. By the time I get my devices working, so that we can do it by physics, he will have figured out how to synthesize absolutely anything, so that this will really be useless."
So if Eric can honor Feynman by name for the concept, why does he consistently fail to honor Taniguchi by name for the vocabulary? It makes Eric smaller, not larger, to fail in living up to this standard of professional courtesy.
Additionally, you are wrong about the scope of Taniguchi's definition, and you have obviously neve bothered to read his 1974 paper. His definition is not particular to silicon, nor does is it limited to anything so gross as 100 nm. From that paper:
"The most fundamental requirement for the removing process by one atom or one molecule is that the processing energy or working energy must be supplied by a bit and concentrated to the particular atom or molecule of the work-piece materials, and also the quantity of a bit of processing energy must be at least of the moecular (sic) bonding energy necessary for removing off the atom or molecule of work-piece from its surface, as shown in Fig. 1." (Fig. 1 then illustrates a graph of bonding potential energy versus interatomic spacing.)
November 6th, 2003 at 11:42 AM
Re:Memology, or engineering classification?
1) There is no malaise in the scientific community. Scientists are so busy proposing fascinating questions and providing productive answers that they have no time for your ilk. 2) The greatest present need in science and engineering is not to draw boundaries between areas, but to break down such boundaries where they exist.
November 6th, 2003 at 3:41 PM
Re:Eric, please give credit where credit is due
Then I suggest you take your complaint up with Eric himself. I don't think anyone was wronged of dishonored in any way. The word "nanotechnology" is an obvious extension to "microtechnology" which was in common use at the time and should be open for use by anyone without constant fawning over whoever may have used it first. Especially of the intended meanings are quite different. Besides, Drexler mainly speaks with his own terms such as Molecular Manufacturing and now apparently "Zettatechnology". It is true I have not read the paper but I have read enough quotes of it to know the context. Taniguchi was not inventing Molecular Manufacturing.
November 6th, 2003 at 4:17 PM
Re:Eric, please give credit where credit is due
Had Eric heard the of term before using it? Crediting Feynman because he had heard what Feynman said, and not crediting Taniguchi because he hadn't ever heard what he said, would be a perfectly good explanation for me.
As for Taniguchi's usage, it seems much more limited than what Drexler means by it. Taniguchi seems to be referring only to fabrication techniques at the nano scale.
November 6th, 2003 at 4:20 PM
Re:From Nano to Zetta
Nanomanufacturing – for building macro-scale products using nano-scale techniques
Active nanotechnology – anything involving assembler-like activity
Nanomaterials – what much of nanotechnology is today – carbon nanotubes, zinc oxide, self-cleaning windows, etc.
November 6th, 2003 at 6:39 PM
Re:Memology, or engineering classification?
Dear AC, let me quote from Eric's article:
"Confusion between these meanings — and the natural urge of numerous researchers to dissociate their current work from promises and dangers that they neither understand nor plan to deliver — has generated much heat."
That identifies the malaise very well. If it's the word "malaise" that you don't like, replace it with another of your choice. Whatever one calls it, we've all seen it rear its head repeatedly over the last several years. We've all witnessed high-profile researchers distancing themselves and their long-established research groups from nanotechnology memes, despite their work impacting strongly on nanoscale issues and being directly applicable to nanotechnology in its wider sense. Eric identifies the problem very accurately.
The "zetta" proposal seeks to divide up the design space a little to help scientists work separately while still cooperating towards a larger composite goal — it lets them "dissociate their current work" from those aspects of nanotechnology with which they are not yet comfortable, on the rather arbitrary basis of component count. I understand the social reasoning there, even if it is a rather feeble engineering solution to the problem.
Clever people aren't always objective and logical, and even when they are, sometimes other agendas intrude and make them seem less so. We've felt the effect in the past, and it's not been helpful. Classifying research areas is a good strategy for aiding cooperation between those who seem to need boundaries and those who see the wider context.
November 9th, 2003 at 8:45 PM
Re:Eric, please give credit where credit is due
Constant fawning? Do you mean to say that Eric has, at some time in the past, publicy credited Taniguchi by name, and so now has no ongoing obligation to do so? Or are you trying to gloss over the fact that Eric has never, not once, publicly admitted that a guy named Taniguchi was the first to use the term to describe atomically precise manufacturing?
Has anyone, anywhere, ever claimed that Taniguchi invented Molecular Manufacturing? I think not. Credit for that concept goes to Feynman, and credit for that vocabulary goes to Eric. By all means let's not have any constant fawning over Eric for inventing that vocabulary. But if we don't fawn over him for that, what's left?
November 10th, 2003 at 9:10 AM
Re:Eric, please give credit where credit is due
Are you serious? Do you seriously mean to defend Eric by suggesting that he was ignorant of the literature? And that after that ignorance was revealed to him he had no obligation to set the record straight? Fascinating!
November 10th, 2003 at 5:03 PM
Re:Eric, please give credit where credit is due
I not very concerned about the history of the origin of the word "nanotechnology".
Feynman gave a visionary table talk at a physics convention and went no further. As I understand it, Drexler invented molecular manufacturing independently without being aware of Feynman's talk. Feynman was merely suggesting a new direction for investigation. Drexler fleshed out the theory of this new path in many ways. Nanosystems was derived from his Ph.D. thesis at M.I.T. Plus he popularized the field essentially by himself. Remember when Drexler started talking about nanotechnology most physicists and chemists said that it would be impossible to work at that level. Now they do it every day in new ways. So the biggest barrier was to strip away misconceptions such as exactly when, from an engineering perspective, does the Uncertainty Principle interfere? People would just wave their hands and say "Oh, but the Uncertainty Principle says I cannot move around a single atom!" Drexler would show them the calculation and they would have to agree that they indeed could work with an individual atom under certain conditions. I see Drexler's biggest contribution as causing an intellectual revolution of sorts regarding what we can ultimately do with technology.
November 10th, 2003 at 10:12 PM
Re:Eric, please give credit where credit is due
This thread began with an excerpt from a paper by Eric which mentioned "an author in Japan in the early 1970s" while failing to credit him (Taniguchi) by name (and at the same time mis-characterizing his work), but which freely gave credit to Feynman.
Obviously you see no problem with this, and you are attempting to change the subject, in part supporting Eric by claiming that he was once upon a time ignorant of the literature (Feynman's talk).
What a unique perspective you have! With friends like you . . .
November 11th, 2003 at 9:42 AM
Re:Eric, please give credit where credit is due
If you are going to attack my motives then at least answer me with your real name.
I am attempting to not let you denigrate Drexler's more that 25 years dedication and contribution to the field. You seemed to say (if that other "anonymous coward" was really you) that besides from the terminology there was nothing left to credit Drexler with. So I ask you, in your opinion, who are the pillars of the field? What if anything do you credit Drexler with and why?
December 10th, 2003 at 10:06 PM
Re:Eric, please give credit where credit is due
Actually, I said that Drexler could NOT be credited with the terminology.
I credit Drexler with one patent, one refereed publication, a Ph.D. in Media Arts and Sciences through the MIT Media Lab with a linguist (Minsky) as first reader, and a penchant for generating publicity.