Comments on: Biology and Self-Repair

By: Low Math, Meekly Interacting

Low Math, Meekly Interacting — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 02:17:18 +0000

@15 I think the cellular replication paradigm is the best. If I had to bet on an approach, I’d say invent a relatively simple “cell” that can assemble with copies of itself into a variety of useful machines, including one that can manufacture more “cells”. The ensemble of cells could fly around doing interesting things, stopping periodically to reassemble into a little cell factory to replace worn out or damaged cells.

By: Kumar

Kumar — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 17:03:28 +0000

Brings back memories of a failed attempt getting into this sort of work! Learning from biology and making cool molecular constructs. Fascinating to think about… but not good to write as your statement of purpose in a grad school essay

By: Cells Repairing Themselves | Cosmic Variance | Theoretical Physics

Cells Repairing Themselves | Cosmic Variance | Theoretical Physics — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 12:20:03 +0000

[...] google_ad_slot = "4185208288"; google_ad_width = 468; google_ad_height = 60; Speaking of self-repair, here’s a fascinating new findingfrom Malin Hernebring in Sweden. Here’s the technical paper, [...]

By: Brian Too

Brian Too — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 00:08:28 +0000

@6. Kernal,

Actually biology uses both repair and replication. My understanding is that repair is heavily used at sub-cellular scales. DNA is frequently repaired for instance. However if the damage is too great and the cell dies, or is killed by the immune system, then replacement becomes the go-to option.

Having a structure or system consisting of large numbers of identical cell types is very useful from an organism maintenance perspective.

By: Overcoming Bias : Adapt Or Start Over?

Overcoming Bias : Adapt Or Start Over? — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 18:30:53 +0000

[...] Living organisms … can, in a wide variety of circumstances, repair themselves. … Which brings up something that has always worried me about nanotechnology … tiny machines that have been heroically constructed … just seem so darn fragile. … surely one has to worry about the little buggers breaking down. … So what you really want is microscopic machinery that is robust enough to repair itself. Fortunately, this problem has already been solved at least once: it’s called “life.” … This is why my utterly underinformed opinion is that the biggest advances will come not from nanotechnology, but from synthetic biology. (more) [...]

By: Cells Repairing Themselves | Cosmic Variance | Discover Magazine

Cells Repairing Themselves | Cosmic Variance | Discover Magazine — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 16:26:22 +0000

[...] of self-repair, here’s a fascinating new finding from Malin Hernebring in Sweden. Here’s the technical [...]

By: Bob Flisser

Bob Flisser — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 10:54:19 +0000

You have the same cold I do, at the same time. Anyway, I thought the idea of nanobots was that they’re supposed to be like bugs: quantity over quality. If thousands of them are deployed for a specific task, it doesn’t matter if a few break down. Or put another way: many of them are expected to break down, which is why they should be delivered in large quantities.

By: Dorothy Gale

Dorothy Gale — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 03:22:20 +0000

At some level, you could say that self-repair does not require life. For instance, we have all (I hope!) played with crystal growing kits. It’s like having a little crystal that fixes itself and then just grows. No intelligent design here, and yet self-healing and growth. Think about it!

By: Greg Davidson

Greg Davidson — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 00:13:33 +0000

Given a modular design, a long model lifetime and an unrestricted replacement parts market you can “repair” a product and keep it in mint condition by simply replacing warn-out parts. Building repair capability into most products is much less efficient than making use of external production facilities. Self-diagnostic capability is very useful so you know when it’s time to replace something. Also important is to have each component designed for easy disassembly into recyclable elements. Most of our products wear out and cannot be economically repaired because manufacturers and allied powerful interests want them to. As personal object printers aka desktop fabbers become affordable I will gradually upgrade the manufactured items in my environment to systems with modular open-source designs. Eventually we will move to nanotech for just about everything and it will work much better than engineering biological systems which are stuck with architectures that are unrelated to our needs.

By: spyder

spyder — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 19:46:04 +0000

I suppose, once we figure out the gene sequencing for human consciousness, we have the capacity to put that into anything we want. Current SciFi edition!

By: Stu Savory

Stu Savory — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 19:45:24 +0000

Sean,
tell us about WDM vs. CDM please.

By: Low Math, Meekly Interacting

Low Math, Meekly Interacting — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 19:37:39 +0000

The biological example is fraught with complexity. What you want are small, simple nanobots

By: Kernal

Kernal — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 19:36:07 +0000

Much of the body’s apparent self-repair is simply self-replication. If something breaks, just replace the broken/dead cells with brand new ones and you’re (almost) as good as new. Because of this, it’s the parts that the body cannot simply be replaced (like nerves) that result in permanent injury when damaged.

For (nano)robots, self-replication is more important than self-repair, and probably easier. So long as enough survive to continue replication, the ability to actually repair is irrelevant. The same may not be true for macro robots simply due to the resources required to build and distribute so many (ie, when your car breaks you fix it; you don’t buy another).

By: Anthony A. Aiya-Oba

Anthony A. Aiya-Oba — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 18:34:15 +0000

Everything is self-replication of everything (Cosmos).-Aiya-Oba (Philosopher).

By: Mark Erickson

Mark Erickson — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 18:18:54 +0000

Um, is it okay that I wish you were sick more often? Or some other wrench in your life that makes you post more non-expert reflections? All that is to say – Awesome!

By: FmsRse12

FmsRse12 — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 17:59:01 +0000

I doubt that self-replicating self-repairing machines will be realised in near future…..many theories at nano scale haven’t been experimentally verified yet and there are many more where both theories and experimental results are not conclusive enough, right now I am working on a topic which has atleast three dominant theories and there are experiments and computer simulations supporting all three to some extent, and only one of them can be correct or none of them …..I mean there are issues which haven’t been resolved even with different experimental approach and simulations

By: Jim Harrison

Jim Harrison — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 17:37:31 +0000

Recommending books in comment threads is about as popular as broken glass in a bathtub, but I’m mentioning Andreas Wagner’s Robustness and Evolvability in Living Systems because it is so specifically on topic. Wagner is especially good in explaining why and, crucially, how, living systems manage to be resistant to breakdowns compared to rationally engineered systems.

By: Matthew Putman

Matthew Putman — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 17:21:16 +0000

I completely agree that synthetic biology is an exciting new field, but it is actually hard for me to completely separate it from nanotechnology. I combine the two actually in a course I teach at Columbia. The idea being that there is self-repair in certain polymer systems, as well as pure biological systems, both which can serve as excellent scaffolding for synthetic systems, like replacement organs. The thing is there are some engineered materials that can assist in the natural stem cell reproduction, by adding strength, aggregation, and optical markers. These, like quantum dots, nanosize silica and even graphene should be the partners in the synthetic bio compound, not a separate discipline.