Materials Science 2100?
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Materials Science 2100? Russ R. Chianelli The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not “Eureka!” but “That’s funny...”
—Isaac Asimov I like nonsense, it wakes up the brain cells.
—Dr. Seuss
Now that we materials scientists have survived the “turn of the century” and the Y2K problem—for which we might have been held responsible—perhaps it is a good time to look forward and wonder what the year 2100 might bring us. Usually, when asked to do this, we happily extrapolate our own field into the future with projections typically based on science already at hand. “Only a few more technological and financial hurdles to go and such-and-such a device will be on the market and available to the public.” So, we can confidently say that by the year 2100 we will have a booming economy fueled by clean solar power or maybe fusion power. We will be transported by safe hydrogen-powered vehicles and communicate effortlessly any information desired almost instantly. All of this is on the drawing board right now. There were those who were equally as confident at the “turn of the last century” that the future was quite predictable. Comfortable in the precision of Newtonian mechanics, great coal-powered steam ships would connect nations in trade and commerce. Automobiles would catch on sooner or later, and copper wires would bind the world together. Lighterthan-air craft would be the “breakthrough” of the 20th century to come. Thomas Alva Edison was the man of the hour as he brought light to millions, forever changing the night. The changes that physics and chemistry would bring to the 20th century were unimaginable to most. Only today have some of us—yes, even materials scientists—really begun to comprehend the meaning of relativity and nuclear physics. Of course, the cold facts of the nuclear age have made the consequences of relativity quite clear. But as I write this, another name is just coming into public view. Very much like Edison, the name of J. Craig Venter, head of Celera Genomics, is not yet a household word, but it will become one as the implications of cracking the genetic code of the human genome enters daily life. MRS BULLETIN/SEPTEMBER 2000
Undoubtedly, this result will change the human way of life more than any other previous scientific breakthrough. We can now only imagine some of the implications. Others are, as yet, unimaginable or perhaps unthinkable. Venter, like Edison, ushers in the new century with a discovery and a vision of staggering proportions. These two scientists hold something else in common. They both proceeded “against the grain” of current scientific orthodoxy to reach rapidly toward practical accomplishment. The so-called “Edisonian” approach to discovery is often derided, but grudgingly admired for its many successes. Edison tried hundreds of materials for his light filaments until he found the right one. Venter used a DNA fragmentation and a brute-force computing approach derided by the establishment to make his discovery in record time. We can be sur
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