Nanorobotics: say goodbye to disease, pain; growing old

By Dick Pelletier

Throughout history, doctors have sought to help the human body repair itself. Many new procedures have been added to the physician's toolkit – x-rays, anesthesia, antibiotics, surgery, and recently, stem cells and gene modification. For the most part though, doctors still rely on the body's own healing powers.

Nearly all sickness, injury, and stress can be traced to cellular malfunction, but today, the ability to enter each individual cell, analyze the problems; then make repairs when necessary, does not exist.

To acquire this capability, experts say; more research is needed in molecular nanotechnology – the ground-breaking science of building things atom-by-atom. First, an assembler device must be created that can grab individual atoms and rearrange them to form living materials, similar to the ways that life fashions its miracles: plants, animals, and us.

Using assemblers, nanotechnologists would then create the ultimate medical tool, the nanorobot; a microscopic-size self-powered machine that can journey through the body, destroy harmful pathogens, enter a cell's nucleus to repair faulty DNA; and thus restore the body to a perfect state of health.

However, critics say developing nanorobots could require 20-years of R&D and cost $1-billion or more; but advocates argue: the technology promises enormous benefits and should be developed at any cost.

In a recent article appearing in What's Happening Magazine, nanotech expert Robert Freitas discusses this futuristic concept and predicts the first fruits of these creations could appear by late 2020s or early 2030s. Many futurists believe nanorobots may one day be considered the world's premier healthcare tool.

The devices include sensors, motors, manipulators, and computers; and can be built in nanofactories, a proposed system that uses nano-assemblers to produce products labor-free, with low material costs.

Building nanorobots cheaply and in therapeutically useful numbers will transform medicine, while improving the efficiency of natural systems by a 1,000-fold, Freitas says.

For example, respirocytes – nanorobot red blood cells – are just 1/100th the volume of natural cells; but will be 1,000 times more efficient in carrying oxygen to our tissues and removing carbon dioxide.

A 5-cc injection of respirocytes, just 1/1,000th of total blood volume, would match the oxygen-carrying ability of the entire human blood mass. These powerful ‘bots could instantly revive emergency victims of carbon monoxide poisoning at the scene of a fire.

Artificial mechanical white blood cells called microbivores are nanorobots that seek and digest harmful bloodborne pathogens, including bacteria, viruses, and fungi. Even if a bacterium has acquired drug resistance to antibiotics, the microbivore would hunt it down and destroy it.

Microbivores would completely clear blood-borne infections in hours or less, faster than the weeks or months often needed for antibiotic-based cures. Other nanorobots could eliminate cancerous tumors, remove circulatory obstructions that cause heart attacks, and prevent brain damage in stroke victims.

Freitas mentions a procedure where cell-repair ‘bots called ‘chromallocytes' would seek out damaged and aging cells and immediately make repairs, or simply replace the cell with a new, younger version.

The implications for extension of healthy lifespan are profound. With annual checkups and cellular repairs, every adult's appearance could be restored once a year to a biological age chosen by the individual. Say goodbye to human aging; hello to appearing forever young and healthy.

Freitas concludes; "Nanorobots may permit us to arrest and reverse the biological effects of aging and medical causes of natural death, severing forever the link between calendar time and biological health."

This revolutionary technology holds great promise for future humans who may never know what it's like to suffer disease and pain, or grow old. Will this "miracle" tool arrive in such a rapid time-frame, and will it deliver all the wonders mentioned in this article? Positive thinkers believe that it will. Comments welcome.