Foresight Nanotech Institute Logo Image of nano  NEMS history
and challenges   "With the advent of NEMS, several groups are
investigating fast logic gates, switches and even computers that
are entirely mechanical. The idea is not new. Charles Babbage
designed the first mechanical computer in the 1820s, which is
viewed as the forerunner to the modern computer. His ideas were
abandoned in the 1960s when the speed of nanosecond electronic
logic gates and integrated circuits vastly outperformed moving
elements. But now that NEMS can move on timescales of a
nanosecond or less, the established dogma of the digital
electronic age needs careful re-examination. But there remains a
gap between today's NEMS devices that are sculpted from bulk
materials and those that will ultimately be built atom by atom.
In the future, complex molecular-scale mechanical devices will
be mass-produced by placing millions of atoms with exquisite
precision or by some form of controlled self-assembly. This will
be true nanotechnology. Natur