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back to article 'Smart dust' to explore alien worlds

A high-ranking British boffin has proposed that other planets might be explored by "smart dust", clouds of tiny electronic devices which would drift intelligently on alien atmosphere currents while communicating by Wi-Fi. John Barker, professor of electronics at the University of Glasgow, outlined his ideas at the Royal …

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  1. amanfromMars

    Magical Mystery Turing2

    Bravo Glasgow. Way to Go. Virtually There Already?

    RSVP.

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  2. Del Merritt

    A Deepness in the Sky

    This comes straight from Vernor Vinge (and some others). Neat idea. Now could it be that the various strains of the influenza virus are a non-Earther's own variant on the theme?

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  3. Daniel Ballado-Torres

    Deja vu ...

    Nanobots ... intelligent swarm ... wait, didn't I read some novel about that???

    Oh yes I did. Michael Crichton's Prey.

    Some centuries might make it theoretically possible for an AI to evolve out of control, way beyond what's expected. And the new intelligence may or may not be friendly towards us. Ow.

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  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    It worked for Doctor Who

    so why shouldn't it work for us? As long as you don't mind your face being a gas-mask.

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