Science Fiction
Dictionary
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
Latest By
Category:
Armor
Artificial
Intelligence
Biology
Clothing
Communication
Computers
Culture
Data Storage
Displays
Engineering
Entertainment
Food
Input Devices
Lifestyle
Living Space
Manufacturing
Material
Media
Medical
Miscellaneous
Robotics
Security
Space Tech
Spacecraft
Surveillance
Transportation
Travel
Vehicle
Virtual
Person
Warfare
Weapon
Work
"There was a time when one old eccentric guy with a notebook could do something important to science. Now even the resources of a major university are often not enough."
- Jerry Pournelle
 |
| Ultra-microrobot | ||
| A nanomachine; a machine whose parts are no bigger than atoms. |
In the story, the last two survivors of an expedition are the victims of a peril too small to see. Pilot Al Kerny had an idea:
He gets out a Scarab - a "microrobot" - about a quarter of an inch long. Scientist Dr. Kurt Rolf was sceptical; even at a quarter of an inch in length, it was hopelessly too big.
"...it's almost certain that what made those tiny wounds in MacDowd and the rest of the men were some kind of solid objects - poisoned projectiles that are so small that they're out of sight. The thing to do is to get down to their level of smallness, magnify them so we can fight them in their own size plane..."
"...you haven't got all of my idea yet, Doc. I don't mean that you should construct this ultra-microrobot with your own fingers, of course - at least, not directly. I mean that you should manipulate the robot control, making our Scarab do the work.
| Rolf was silent for a moment. Then fierce eagerness seized him...
"With the Scarab as big as a beetle, I could make a Scarab as big as a sand grain. This second Scarab could build a miniature of itself, as big as a dust grain. The third Scarab could construct a fourth, bearing the same proportions as the first to the second, or the second to the third. And so on, down, to the limit imposed by the ultimate indivisibility of the atoms themselves."
|
| Technovelgy from A Menace in Miniature,
by Raymond Z. Gallun. Published by Astounding Stories in 1937 Additional resources -
|
This story clearly anticipates the idea of a nanomachine, and provides a method for constructing such a device. Other parts of the story contain speculations on whether or not materials would have the necessary properties in extremely small sizes.
Nobel prize-winning physicist Richard Feynman made quite a stir in his famous 1959 speech on nanotechnology by essentially reiterating what Gallun suggested more than twenty years earlier.
… Now, I want to build much the same device—a master-slave system which operates electrically. But I want the slaves to be made especially carefully by modern large-scale machinists so that they are one-fourth the scale of the “hands” that you ordinarily maneuver. So you have a scheme by which you can do things at one- quarter scale anyway—the little servo motors with little hands play with little nuts and bolts; they drill little holes; they are four times smaller. Aha! So I manufacture a quarter-size lathe; I manufacture quarter-size tools; and I make, at the one-quarter scale, still another set of hands again relatively one-quarter size! This is one-sixteenth size, from my point of view. And after I finish doing this I wire directly from my large-scale system, through transformers perhaps, to the one-sixteenth-size servo motors. Thus I can now manipulate the one-sixteenth size hands.
Well, you get the principle from there on. It is rather a difficult program, but it is a possibility.
Science fiction fans of course know that when Feyman is taking about "set of master and slave hands" he is referring to waldoes, which were invented by Robert Heinlein. So, I think sf writers anticipated this idea no matter how you slice it.
And here's an even earlier reference, the microhands by Boris Zhitkov - in 1931!
Compare these ideas to the microhands from Microhands (Микроруки) (1931) by Boris Zhitkov, the microrobot from The Scarab (1936) by Raymond Z. Gallun, the ultra-microrobot from Menace in Miniature (1937) also by Gallun, waldo from Waldo (1942) by Robert Heinlein, the golden shuttles from The Mechanical Mice (1941) by Maurice Hugi, the autofac nanorobots from Autofac (1955) by Philip K. Dick, the nanomachine swarm from The Invincible (1954) by Stanislaw Lem, the Christmas Bush robot from Rocheworld by Robert Forward and the robot cells from Robot City (1987) by Michael Kube-McDowell.
Now comes the interesting question: How do we make such a tiny mechanism? I leave that to you. However, let me suggest one weird possibility. You know, in the atomic energy plants they have materials and machines that they can’t handle directly because they have become radioactive. To unscrew nuts and put on bolts and so on, they have a set of master and slave hands, so that by operating a set of levers here, you control the “hands” there, and can turn them this way and that so you can handle things quite nicely.
Comment/Join this discussion ( 0 ) | RSS/XML | Blog This |
Additional
resources:
More Ideas
and Technology from A Menace in Miniature
More Ideas
and Technology by Raymond Z. Gallun
Tech news articles related to A Menace in Miniature
Tech news articles related to works by Raymond Z. Gallun
Ultra-microrobot-related
news articles:
- Robots Making Smaller Robots Making Smaller Robots
- 3D DNA-Directed Nanoassembly
- Robotic Insect Pop-Up Origami Fabrication
- World's First Rapid 3D Nanoscale Printer
- UR3 Robot At Work On Copies Of Itself
- Smartphone Microdrone Concept - Viva Vivo!
- Smallest Remote-Controlled Walking Robot Crabs
| Hybrid Wind Solar Devices |
| BeamBike Solar Power Canopy For Electric Bikes |
| REALLY Remote Control Excavators |
| Your Solar Electric Paint Is Ready, Larry Niven |
Want to Contribute an
Item?
It's easy:
Get the name of the item, a
quote, the book's name and the author's name, and Add
it here.
| <Previous | Next> |
|
|
|
Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Science Fiction Invention Timeline, or see what's New.
|
Science Fiction
Timeline
1600-1899
1900-1939
1940's 1950's
1960's 1970's
1980's 1990's
2000's 2010's
'...the rocket’s landing-arms automatically unfolded.'
'...points and patches of light... sliding all over their faces in a programmed manner that had been designed to foil facial recognition systems.'
'...the combined Wind-Suncatcher, like a spray of tulips mounted fanwise.'
'I went to the control room where the three other men were manipulating their mechanical men.'
'The low-slung monorail car, straddling its single track, bored through the shadows on a slowly rising course.'
'It was a smooth ovoid floating a few inches from the floor...'
'... he thrust in his charging arm to replenish his store of energy.'
'...the terrible Jovian gravity that made each movement an effort.'
