Posted on 03/30/2005 6:36:41 AM PST by Arkie2
Nasa is working on the ultimate in adaptable spacecraft - Ants, or autonomous nanotechnology swarms.
The first steps have just been taken at the Goddard space flight centre in Maryland by an awkward robot creature called the Tetwalker hobbling across the floor of the lab.
Tet stands for tetrahedral: the prototype is an empty pyramid with four electric motors at each node linked to each other by six struts.
Tet can telescope the length of each strut, thus altering the robot's centre of gravity so it topples - enabling it by successive topples to move flip-flop fashion in any direction.
Future models will have motors measured in thousandths of a millimetre, and eventually millionths. Struts will be replaced by carbon nanotubes invisible to the eye and completely retractable - enabling the pyramid to shrink until its motors touch.
In perhaps 30 years, millions of Tetwalkers will work in swarms, equipped with collective artificial intelligence, changing collective shape as needed, journeying to planets by forming solar sails riding on the pressure of sunbeams.
Entering an atmosphere, they could form an aerodynamic shield; on landing, they could morph into a snake and slither over broken ground. If they found something, they could grow into an antenna and radio Earth. And if they hit something, they simply flow back into the right shape.
"When we get hurt, new cells replace damaged ones. In a similar way, undamaged units in a swarm will join together, allowing it to tolerate extensive damage and still carry out its mission," said Steven Curtis, of Nasa. "If current robotic rovers topple over on a distant planet, they are doomed.
"Tetwalkers move by toppling over. It's a very reliable way to get around."
ping
30 years away, huh? Will my aero-car arrive before that, or after?
I don't think it's going to take 30 years.
And yes, it reminds me of the Crichton book too.
If they can reproduce themselves, then we can terraform Mars with them.
Maybe they'll decide to terraform Earth and get rid of us!
I've had mine for the last ten years! Didn't you get the memo?
This Tet is a 3D simplex (actually 4D if you count time) and using arrays of them seems an excellent way to handle the many tasks and vagaries involved in space pioneering.
Buildign flying cars is easy. Dealing with the associated air-traffic control problems, on the other hand... let's put it this way: do you trust the idiots who can't drive in two dimensions with a third one?
Anyone remember the sci-fi fantasy book "Trillions"?
Alien micromachines land on Earth, scare the bejeebers out of mankind, and then leave.
But they were morphing machines capable of interconnecting to form any shape.
Yeah, I read Chrichton's Swarm. One of the scary things is the programming using hunter models . Where the robot learns to overcome problems. One science-fiction author (Rudy Rucker) actually writes programs like that for "boppers" his living robots. I think he offers it for free on his web-site.
Wasn't Crichton's book about the nanomachines titled "Prey"?
Oops! Looks like I'm making it up as I go. You are of course correct.
Dear NASA: please send more crunchy things. They were delicious. -Planet Zygon 3
Augh! Shades of the REPLICATORS!! (SG-1...)
Do you have any links to NASA web pages? This is very interesting.
If I said that a few days ago I was daydreaming of a Fulerene structure with linear actuator links and reconfigurable nodes, would anyone believe me? Not that it matters anyway.
Day late and a dollar short again.
The only downside is that the NanoSwarms are powered by human flesh, but I'm sure that won't be a big problem.
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