Adrian wrote:
> True...once we have self-replicating nanorobots. [snip]
> Only problem is: we don't have them yet.
I addressed this with my "mixed" strategy development approach
back in March. You use space-based resources or most structural
and fuel requirements and you use Earth based materials for
sophisticated devices (which do not have to be a significant
fraction of the mass of the microsats).
See:
http://www.aeiveos.com/~bradbury/Papers/SDP.html
The microsat development approach seems to be something that
can be done by a group of distributed engineering teams
at universities (or even community colleges) if it were
properly sold. Its like the Lego MindStorms phenomena.
If you make it easy enough for people to become microsat
designers then lots of people might jump on the bandwagon.
My Nano@Home proposal is downloaded several hundred times
a month and the SETI@Home people are submitting a proposal
to NSF to see if they will fund the development of the
software tools.
Robert
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