The distinguished physicist Richard Feynman first presented the concept of nanotechnology, but not the word, in a speech he gave to the American Physical Society on December 29, 1959, entitled "There's Plenty of Room at the Bottom." Feynman envisioned the day when people would have the ability to manipulate individual atoms and molecules so that one set of precise tools could be created to make a proportionally smaller set, on down to the needed scale.

Nanotechnology was not used until 1974, when Norio Taniguchi, a professor at Tokyo Science University, introduced it in a paper. The science got more fully underway when Gerd Binnig and Heinrich Rohrer created the scanning tunneling microscope in 1980, and individual atoms could actually be seen. During the next few years, Dr. Eric Drexler, now regarded as the father of nanotechnology, wrote Engines of Creation: The Coming Era of Nanotechnology, a book that more fully developed the concept.

One imperative of nanotechnology is that nanodevices must be able to self-assemble. Because these machines will be so small, it will literally take millions of them to do some tasks on a scale that would be helpful to humans. At Cornell they have created little four-inch-square (10.16 cm) blocks that can replicate themselves. The plastic cubes sliced diagonally into two halves that swivel, and the electromagnets on the cubes turn on and off, allowing them to pick up and release other cubes. A three-cube stack takes a minute to copy itself.

One concern about nanotechnology is that if it is created to self-build, the nanomachine might keep building and building and building unchecked. With this particular device, the Cornell scientists have developed safety features so that the machine cannot go unrestrained. To begin with, the machine relies on power from a base plate, and researchers must also feed the robots with new blocks. Another safeguard is that the number of blocks cannot exceed the number of plates. . .

Free term papers are not written to satisfy your specific instructions. You can use our professional writing services to buy a custom written research paper, term paper, or essay on Health at affordable price. CustomTermPapers is the best solution for those who seek help in writing term papers, essays, and research papers related to Health and other relevant topics.