Selfconfiguring mechanical system example

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Self-configuring mechanical system example

• Vision Set of atomic building blocks, each
  with a little bit of computing, sensing, and
  communication (and possibly actuation)
• Three steps
• Immediate Smart building materials
• Two years out Reconfiguring electromechanical
  systems
• Ten years out Vat of self-assembling parts

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First step Smart building materials

• Prototype building block is a Lego etc they
  collaborate to decide how to be a bunker, a
  bridge, etc, and they tell the untrained builder
  where and when to put them down
• Visionary application after an earthquake the
  surviving slabs collaborate to understand whats
  supporting what, whats unstable, etc and give
  advice to untrained rescue workers. (Maybe they
  also sense and communicate with victims.)

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Second step Reconfiguring electromechanical
systems

• Prototype Building block is a module of a
  modular robotic system they collaborate to
  produce desired behaviors like locomotion and
  transportation.
• Visionary application building blocks are
  individual components of complex mechanical
  systems (fuel injector, solenoid, etc) each has
  a little sensecompcomm and they collaborate to
  monitor and describe the health of the whole
  system (automobile, etc) to its user. Thus,
  systemwide health monitoring and repair is an
  automatic consequence of the capabilities of the
  individual components.

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Third step Vat of self-assembling parts

• Command it to grow a wound dressing, a smart
  desk, a truck, ...
• Could also be used for repair or reconfiguration
• What are the building blocks?
• Each one has some computational capability (and
  comm, sense, etc)
• Analogy (1970) computers and wires gt arpanet
• Future carbon, silicon, chemical power
  supplies, bacteria, wireless comm
• Robot factory
• Farther future nanotech? Carbon atoms etc.
• How do you program the system?
• The parts collaborate amorphously to form the
  needed interactions
• The specification for the desired global behavior
  comes from outside
• near term detailed external spec of physical
  assembly sequence
• med term external spec describes only desired
  outcome, not procedure
• far term self-assembly from seeds
• Existing work
• Early 90s, UCB fluidic self assembly for arrays
  of lasers (but no computation or programming)