WSJ story leveraging a Nature feature about researchers who create atomic-scale assembly line where DNA robots at 1/100,000th a human hair width can make 8 products--nothing too complex but still!
For the first time, microscopic robots made from DNA molecules can walk, follow instructions and work together to assemble simple products on an atomic-scale assembly line, mimicking the machinery of living cells, two independent research teams announced Wednesday.
Until this, most of the nanotech breakthroughs were novelty demos, like putting sunglasses on a dust mite--that sort of gee-whiz stuff.
Now, we're talking nano robots that crank chem compounds or do a Fantastic Voyage job on your body (BTW, Paul Greengrass is doing a 2013 remake!).
Today, nano-materials have been exploited in hundreds of products, but this is the first time production was achieved by "exotic man-made DNA objects" so small that their instructions had to be encoding in the world around them (e.g., chemical markers that direct their movements).
Still think nuclear weapons are going to define WMD and the world of security in the 21st century?