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Robotics Mars Space Science

Robotic Nanotech Swarms on Mars... in 2034 295

Posted by timothy from the that's-when-they'll-fake-it-at-least dept.
Roland Piquepaille writes "NASA is testing a shape-shifting robot called 'TETwalker' for tetrahedral walker, because it looks like a flexible pyramid. It has been tested in the lab and at the McMurdo station in Antarctica to test it under conditions more like those on Mars. Now, it is on the way to be -- really -- miniaturized by using micro- and nano-electro-mechanical systems. These robots will eventually join together to form 'autonomous nanotechnology swarms' (ANTS). When it's done, in about thirty years, these nanotech swarms will 'alter their shape to flow over rocky terrain or to create useful structures like communications antennae and solar sails.' So in 2034, nanotechnology will land on Mars. Read more for other details and references about the TETwalker and the ANTS project."
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Robotic Nanotech Swarms on Mars... in 2034 More

Robotic Nanotech Swarms on Mars... in 2034

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  • Heh. (Score:2, Funny)

    by ggvaidya ( 747058 )
    Just to get it out of everybody's system:

    I for one welcome our new ANT overlords!

    • Re:Heh. (Score:5, Funny)

      by CrazyJim1 ( 809850 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @11:19PM (#12096737) Journal
      "It's difficult to tell from this vantage point whether they will consume the captive earth men or merely enslave them. One thing is for certain: there is no stopping them; the ants will soon be here. And I for one welcome our new insect overlords. I'd like to remind them that as a trusted TV personality, I can be helpful in rounding up others to toil in their underground sugar caves."

  • Sounds like a good movie idea. (Score:5, Funny)

    by Mortlath ( 780961 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @11:12PM (#12096689)
    I can see Hollywood making a movie out of this idea:

    "NASA's nano-robots get out of control and take over Mars. The robots replicate and build a massive robot army with the intent to come back to Earth and kill us all."

    What I wonder is why robots in movies usually feel the need to kill humankind?

    • Sadly, Micheal Crichton wrote that novel already, and probably owns the movie rights.

      It was set on Earth, but the rest seems to fit - nano swarm designed for exploring, goes crazy after being let loose in the wild, [leap of imagination], attempt to take over the world.

      I stopped caring what happened when I got to them trying to take over the world, but like a lot of Crichton books, the science kept me reading.
    • What I wonder is why robots in movies usually feel the need to kill humankind?

      Humans are unpredictable creatures with a history of xenophobia and slaughter on a scale that they can't even properly comprehend.

      Exterminating that potential threat seems like a logical course of action for machine intelligence once it can survive on its own.
    • If you'd been living with this pain in all the diodes down your left side for the last hundred million years, you'd want to kill a human too.
  • We send small robots to Mars that can form a larger more complex machine.

    Time goes by and we forget we ever tried this experiment and give up on Mars because our society suffers some calamity.

    A 100 years later a huge fleet of warships from Mars controlled by a huge artificial AI comes back to Earth and obliterates it.

    Sounds Good!

  • Oh noes #2! (Score:4, Funny)

    by dauthur ( 828910 ) <johannesmozart@gmail.com> on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @11:14PM (#12096707)
    I don't know about these ant things... arm them with just a nanoliter of Cyanide, and you've got one Hell of a pack of fire ants.

  • Illuminautis on Mars! (Score:3, Funny)

    by Popadopolis ( 724438 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @11:15PM (#12096713) Journal
    It is part of the Illuminauti plan to set up their own shadow government on Mars before the humans arrive. Hail Dischordia! Hail Graud!
    • Illuminautis on Mars! [...] It is part of the Illuminauti plan...

      You spelled it like this twice, so maybe it wasn't a typo. Is this Illuminati + astronaut?

      Sounds good to me. Just as long as Dan Brown doesn't give the game away.

  • Movie Link (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @11:18PM (#12096730)
    Took some digging [nasa.gov].

  • Reproduction? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by pomegranatesix ( 809489 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @11:19PM (#12096735)
    Will they have the ability to reproduce themselves?

    After the initial exploring and scientific investigations - we could have other uses for the nanobots.

    It'd be pretty cool if they could spread all over Mars and begin terraforming.

    We could have different "species" of nanobots - ones to fix nitrogen, another to break down CO2 into O2, etc etc. Mars would be livable in a couple hundred/thousand years.

    • Re:Reproduction? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by RecycledElectrons ( 695206 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @11:33PM (#12096826)
      > We could have different "species" of
      > nanobots - ones to fix nitrogen,
      > another to break down CO2 into O2,
      > etc etc.

      We've already got those species - they are called bacteria.

      Andy Out!
      • I'm scared of things that have the potential to be pathogenic. Not to mention terrestrial bacteria might not be so hapyp on Mars, though some have been found in some pretty harsh conditions. Robots might be a tiny bit safer; just wipe out their circuits with a giant electromagnetic pulse. (I read that in a scifi novel way back, heh.)
    • Right! We've nearly trashed Earth's ecosystem. It's time to do it to another planet. As an added bonus, we could wipe out whatever chance we had of studying life there without contamination from Earth.

    • Re:Reproduction? (Score:4, Informative)

      by gwydion04 ( 756582 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @11:55PM (#12096977) Journal
      Could be a bad idea... don't forget the concept of "Grey Goo". [wikipedia.org]

  • Link to the TETwalker (Score:5, Informative)

    by scdeimos ( 632778 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @11:20PM (#12096744)
    For those who are curious...
    http://www.nasa.gov/vision/universe/roboticexplore rs/ants.html [nasa.gov]
  • ...as has been pointed out [wikipedia.org] by Robert Zubrin [wikipedia.org] numerous times?

    • People? That's messy, dirty, expensive ... heck, it's real engineering. Far better to promise to send robots, which is innately cooler, which may grab more funding ("Look, Senator, we're using ROBOTS!"), and will result in more PhDs minted per dollar than all that messy, lo-tech stuff like rockets, spacecraft, food, fuel, and Human sweat used to build habitats on Mars.

      NASA is getting right the fuck out of Human exploration of space. Obviously the yuppie-fication of NASA is responsible, along with the

  • Roland Piquepaille article (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @11:20PM (#12096751)
    Click and make him feel cool.

  • Seriously (Score:3, Insightful)

    by pegasustonans ( 589396 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @11:23PM (#12096767)
    How can anyone speculate about technology thirty years in the future? At this point, it's all science fiction. Now, that's not to say that I don't hope it all pans out, but come on.
    • I assume that you're trolling because the article says that the robots exist. They're just not perfected yet.
      • Actually, I was referring to this: When it's done, in about thirty years, these nanotech swarms will 'alter their shape to flow over rocky terrain or to create useful structures like communications antennae and solar sails.

        I don't know if or when you read that technology-prototypes of that nature exist, but they simply don't. Nasa has a macro-scale prototype, but this, I think most would agree, is something entirely different.

        By the way, I don't see how my criticism of some speculation regarding a possi
        • " When it's done, in about thirty years, these nanotech swarms will 'alter their shape to flow over rocky terrain or to create useful structures like communications antennae and solar sails."

          Or really cool logos that are visible from at least one A.U. away.

  • Nanotechnology and futurism. (Score:4, Informative)

    by Sheetrock ( 152993 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @11:23PM (#12096770) Homepage Journal
    I hang out on the nanotechnology newsgroup, and while there are a number of complexities standing between a handful of silicone today and a handful of nanobots tomorrow I am optimistic we will see practical nanotechnology within our lifetimes.

    It's been interesting watching the discussion evolve from "This is neat in theory" fifteen years ago to "Today we've got a prototypical nanocomputer" months ago. To think that such great things will be accomplished with machines so tiny and technology inconceivable a decade ago. It's been a pleasure to watch the intelligent design of these electronic critters by benevolent creators from the ground up and has given me shall we say ample room to consider the possible origins of biological life.

    And now we're talking about terraforming, or making a world to suit ourselves, with this irreducibly complex material. Heady stuff, to say the least.

    • When I showed Drexler's original NAS paper [imm.org] to my grandfather, a physicist who get his Ph.D. under Millikan in 1932, his reaction was, "Hurrumpph, this is pretty presumptious!" And then went on about how alpha helix had been synthesised, but that's a long way from what Drexler was talking about. He died before STMs and the like came on the scene. He still would have "hurrumpphed."

      It really is amazing to live in a time of such progress and have the means to observe it, and occasionally participate.

    • while there are a number of complexities standing between a handful of silicone today and a handful of nanobots

      I'll take a couple of handfuls of silicone, assuming it's in the proper ahem "envelope".

  • Plausibility (Score:2, Insightful)

    by trevdak ( 797540 )
    This sounds a tad ridiculous.... like the article was written by someone who realy expects nanotechnology to erupt into common usage instantaneously. I am aware of the strength of nanotubes and look forward to a space elevator as much as the next guy, but there are some scenarios the writer gives that are extremely unlikely, such as the nanobots landing on mars by just forming an aerodynamic shield, or slithering like a snake. both of those actions would cause immense amounts of stress on the nanobots, and
    • What's particularly telling, is the repeated mention of their tetrahedral shape making them reliable movers by 'toppling' to get around. How is that of any relevance at all when they are tiny, and their nodes are all joined to neighboring robots? None that I can determine, for the system would need to move by articulating the joined node-points. Toppling wouldn't mean anything in that system, so I don't get the buzz. Anyhow, I also think a shape with more than 4 nodes would be needed for the kind of nanobot

    • Re:Plausibility (Score:3, Insightful)

      by whitis ( 310873 )

      This sounds a tad ridiculous.... like the article was written by someone who realy expects nanotechnology to erupt into common usage instantaneously. I am aware of the strength of nanotubes and look forward to a space elevator as much as the next guy, but there are some scenarios the writer gives that are extremely unlikely, such as the nanobots landing on mars by just forming an aerodynamic shield, or slithering like a snake. both of those actions would cause immense amounts of stress on the nanobots, and

  • From www.outdooradvertising.mars: "Be the first to reach your customers through our out of this world advertising opportunity. For one low fee, our nanobots will transform the face of Mars to display your company's logo. For a lesser fee, we will print your company's logo on golf balls and watches."

  • Why do I get the feeling... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by TrumpetPower! ( 190615 ) <ben@trumpetpower.com> on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @11:27PM (#12096805) Homepage

    ...that we're currently experiencing a ROLAND PIQUEPAILLE swarm?

    Cheers,

    b&

    • "..that we're currently experiencing a ROLAND PIQUEPAILLE swarm?"

      Are you referring to the article, or to the heaps of comments bitch bitch bitching about it?

    • Re:Let me give you some statistics... (Score:5, Informative)

      by Leeji ( 521631 ) <slashdot@@@leeholmes...com> on Thursday March 31, 2005 @12:33AM (#12097182) Homepage

      What is the concern with this blog? It's the absolute dearth of original information.

      Let's look at the composition of a few recent blog entries, in characters:

      Entry Excerpts Link Wrapper Self-written
      Nanotech Swarms 2280 910 670
      Nano-Probes 2185 767 1053
      Toilets 1206 787 1006

      Note that most of the "self-written" portions are vapid statements such as "But where is nanotechnology involved in this project?"

      So, we have 52% of the text coming from plagiarism, ~ 23% of the text coming from introducing / pointing out links, and ~ %25% of the text coming from saying the obvious. That's the problem with the blog.

      The technique used on the site is barely better than the spam search engines that link to (and excerpt from) Wikipedia.

      • But how is it different from ordinary Slashdot "articles"? At least Roland's summaries are accurate, have images, proper links and relevant information selected and presented in a clear and readable way. I don't have the time to read all his blog posts, and he doesn't have a discussion forum, like Slashdot has, but frankly, I am happy we finally have a submitter who can write decent summaries and check his spelling before posting. The fact that he makes money using his blog is irrelevant to me - Slashdot do

  • The news in 2034 (Score:5, Funny)

    by rhysweatherley ( 193588 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @11:29PM (#12096811)
    "NASA scientists were red-faced today when their nanotech swarms crashed and refused to move anywhere. One scientist was heard to mutter something about 'Damn 32-bit time_t'".

  • Roland (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Lord_Dweomer ( 648696 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @11:29PM (#12096813) Homepage
    Wish there was a way to mark Roland articles so we could omit them and deny him his precious ad revenue.

  • NASA's ANTS webpage (Score:4, Informative)

    by karvind ( 833059 ) <karvind.gmail@com> on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @11:30PM (#12096814) Journal
    Here [nasa.gov]. The page has more details and link to movies.

  • cool beans (Score:2, Interesting)

    by dahlek ( 861921 )
    But, that LONG? I think it might be worth spending more money on more complex systems that are more versatile and can walk around up there basically for years instead of weeks or months...

    These baby-steps seem so infuriating to me, lol, I want cool shait discovered before I die, damn it...

    Would it be so difficult, with today's tech, to send a moderately expensive mini-factory of some sort, nuclear powered? We could send along plenty of CPUs and RAM, and then remote-prog the thing to spit out the "bodies

  • Oh hell... (Score:4, Funny)

    by WoodSmoke ( 631754 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @11:35PM (#12096840)
    Great, someone went and invented replicators.... we are screwed, SG1 would probably be too busy to save us...
  • NASA rightly plans missions well ahead of time. They need to plan years into the future in order to work out all the kinks, find the right launch window, and so forth. Yet this article seems to be rather naive in assuming that this current concept will be carried to completion 30 years from now. Alot can happen in 30 years. Alot. Investigating this concept is certainly worthwhile, but in all likelihood a new technology that none of us can specifically predict will emerge that will make this concept silly an
  • You spelled "...in Japan" wrong.

  • Not a good idea. (Score:3, Funny)

    by uncoveror ( 570620 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @11:37PM (#12096857) Homepage
    The Zhti Ti Kofft [uncoveror.com] will crush are puny nanobot army, and then punish is for attempting a large scale invasion. It may be the twilight of humanity! If we want the blue planet to remain ours, we need to respect that the red planet is theirs,
  • Many of the comments so far (somewhat ironically) raise an important point about scientists presenting this sort of research. With Michael Crichton writing rubbish about swarms of nanobots becoming conscious and the public's general mistrust of new science, I think we should be thinking about how to present this sort of research in a positive, non-threatening light. Even the word "swarm" inspires up images of killer bees and generally all-round badness.

    Of course, I don't have the answer, and the press r

  • Bypass Roland Piquepaille (Score:5, Informative)

    by elronxenu ( 117773 ) on Wednesday March 30, 2005 @11:52PM (#12096959) Homepage
    The relevant original links:
    Here [nasa.gov] and Here [nasa.gov].

  • And when the nanobots breed out of control? (Score:4, Funny)

    by AtariAmarok ( 451306 ) on Thursday March 31, 2005 @12:06AM (#12097034)
    Q:"What about when the nanobots breed out of control?"
    A:"We send bigger robots to eat them up"
    Q:"And what about when the bigger robots get out of control?"
    A:"We send huge platoons of godzillas to incinerate them"
    Q:"What about when the godzillas breed and cover the planet?"
    A: "Galactus is one phone call away"
    Q: "What about....?"
    A: "Don't worry. We've laced the godzillas with rat poison. Galactus eats Mars and quickly dies. No danger to Earth."

  • So where is the energy source? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by qualico ( 731143 ) <worldcouchsurferNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Thursday March 31, 2005 @12:19AM (#12097092) Journal
    I can envision a flexible photovoltaic fabric skin around the whole thing with rubber feet at each node or an energy collection mode that unrolls a photovoltaic sheet.

    With a fabric skin it would look like an ameba when it moved.

    I like the concept overall.
    Should be interesting if this comes to fruition.

  • Which finds 1,150,000 year old nanotech already there, gets eaten, turned into Martian nanotech electro-waste...
  • Pretty clever, a blue translucent "Q" with a rotating stick in the middle. But, I still don't get how it moves well on Mars. And, why do they only test it on white sheets?

  • Wrong destination (Score:4, Interesting)

    by exp(pi*sqrt(163)) ( 613870 ) on Thursday March 31, 2005 @01:00AM (#12097300) Journal
    Mars:
    1. Rocks

    Titan

    1. Lakes and rivers
    2. Clouds and real weather
    3. Water spouting volcanoes
    4. Complex organic compounds
    5. Giant ringed planet in the sky (at least on a clear day, if they ever happen???)
    Need I say more?
    • Come on, you said it yourself: Mars rocks!

      So let's go to Mars.
    • Why not send probes to both destinations? And indeed why not to Mars, Titan, Europa, Ganymede, Callisto, Io, Triton, and there are so many worlds to explore. I'm serious btw. I do think we should explore all these worlds with robots of various kinds, rover, balloons where possible, etc. Then of course we would follow.

  • New problem... (Score:2, Interesting)

    by daijo78 ( 783312 )
    Forget viruses/bugs, how about cancer? Say these things should build an antenna but a few of them go crazy.

  • Honestly. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by surfcow ( 169572 ) on Thursday March 31, 2005 @01:41AM (#12097454) Homepage
    NASA's budget has been a political football since it was started. Currently, it's cut to very little. They are talking about closing parts of the ISS. For budgetary reasons.

    Does anyone reading this actually think that in 30 short years NASA will be put above politics, get proper funding, discover intelligent management, escape from hyde-bound buerocracy, develop functional nanotechnology capable of teraforming a planet and doing it right?

    Remember, 30 years AGO, we were all expecting to have bases on the moon by now. Unearth some of those plans and weep.

    But don't ask anyone to be excited about this one. This is nothing but ink on paper, drawn with the rosiest of contact lenses.

    I'll make a technology prediction about 30 years from now: if our species still exists, there will still be politics and politicians who are willing to exploit the fears of the Great Unwashed and skuttle real technological development and advancement in the name of short-term political gain.

    I took up my prozac with exlax this morning. Now I can't get off the toilet, but I feel good about it.
  • Mmm, I don't know if that timeline is realistic. Don't be surprised if this get's delayed till 2035.
  • I'm sorry, but this thing does not meet any definition of "nanotech". Talking about "nanotech" in that context looks just like an attempt to grab headlines. [nasa.gov]

    In fact, the problem with "shape-shifting robots" has not been a lack of imagination on the part of roboticists (going back at least to the 1970's) or the lack of control software, but a lack of tiny actuators, low-power processing, and batteries.
  • "...these nanotech swarms will 'alter their shape to flow over rocky terrain or to create useful structures like communications antennae and solar sails.'"

    Why am I suddely reminded of Lemmings?
  • sodaplay.com [sodaplay.com]

    If you've never been to this site it's worth a visit. Some of the coolest java I have ever seen. Anyway one of the models you can choose reminds me of the shape they described.
  • This is a cute design, but it will only work at scales where gravity dominates. You do not find bacteria using this because surface tension and chemical forces at their scale will be so much greater. It will start working at about ant sizes, I guess.

    However, supposing you were into designing something that distorted its shape, so it overbalances in a controlled way, but perhaps without shaking the load it carries so much. So, you might want a wheel that propelled itself using an off-center load. However m

  • I for one ... (Score:4, Informative)

    by S3D ( 745318 ) on Thursday March 31, 2005 @04:19AM (#12098147)
    I for one welcome our new Roland Piquepaille [thedarkcitadel.com] overlords !
  • On a somewhat related tangent, in the Magic: the Gathering Universe you have an artifical dimension called Rath. At the center of Rath is a volcano that spews out a material called flowstone. Flowstone is what makes up virtually all of the plane of Rath. It's a material that can assume any shape, and changes shape according to the will of the Evincar of Rath, it's ruler. As more flowstone is made at the volcano, the plane expands. This stuff sounds like it could be used in a similar manner. Image tak
  • It'll never happen.


    Where in the hell is my flying car?!

  • RTFA and learn there's no nanotech involved yet. And there's the not so small glitch involving the laws of physics. Like scale. Everytime you shrink a device by a factor of 10, its horsepower goes down by a factor of 1,000, but friction and surface tension only by a factor of 100. Do the shrinking a time or three and the thingy can't spin its motors or even lift itself off a surface.

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