X-Message-Number: 8671
From: Thomas Donaldson <>
Subject: Re: CryoNet #8661
Date: Sun, 12 Oct 1997 22:06:29 -0700 (PDT)

Hi John!

Well, well, well. I put this article together with others in the latest
PERIASTRON. It doesn't just look at biology, you know. Moreover, there's some
very good reasons to believe that the quantum dots these guys used could
actually be implemented small enough and close enough that their computer
would actually run a normal temperatures. Materials scientists are into 
doing such things, and they have in at least one case (probably more, really)
created rows of dots of the right nanosize already. The idea was to use a
biological template (which was destroyed in creating the material). 

If you've seen the latest issue of SCIENCE, someone else is suggesting that
we use buckytubes as wires. We'll see. There is a real problem of how much
we can miniaturize, and silicon and even gallium arsenide are likely only
to hold it off for a few years.

As someone who also studies history, I will point out that for one reason or
another advances in computing may also slow down. The problem isn't just 
what's physically possible: quantum dots and buckytubes tell us that. The
problem is also just how far people will really fund the research to take
us further. It's not that we cease advancing, but rather that we decide to 

advance in another direction for a while. Like cheap space travel, for example.

So these ideas may turn out to be implemented, not soon, but
say 100 years from now, when our need for computers has once more grown 
enough that we need even smaller and better ones. Just a thought. Both of
these ideas above remain beautiful ideas, even if it takes them a long time
to catch on.

			Long long life,

				Thomas Donaldson

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