What could picotechnology do that nanotechnology can’t do?

[Maximum77]

I’m trying to include picotechnology in my story but I can’t tell if I should just make it nanotechnology. But I want to use Pico. What scientific things can pico do that nano wouldn’t be advanced enough to do?

[Peelee]

I’m trying to include picotechnology in my story but I can’t tell if I should just make it nanotechnology. But I want to use Pico. What scientific things can pico do that nano wouldn’t be advanced enough to do?

Picotechnology could do general chemistry.

For reals, though. It's a hypothetical level of tech. Currently non-existant. If you want to use it, it can do anything you want it to do.

[tiornys]

Tech on the scale of picometers is literally sub-atomic. That is, if it makes more sense to measure your units of technology in picometers than nanometers, you are working with things smaller than a hydrogen atom. On the other hand, you're still much larger than the size of atomic components like protons and neutrons (which would be femtometer scale). I'm honestly not sure what lives in this in-between space.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

The smallest atoms are around 0.1nm. Evev if you made molecular machinery so simple it's a bit under a nanometer in size that would still be called nanotechnology. So as Peelee said pico or femtotechnology would be subatomic in nature. At that point it would also stop interacting with molecular matter in quite te regular way. To a molecule or nanomachine the bloodstream is a mixture of small hydrophilic molecules in a fluid phase with an assortment of small and large molecules in solution and giant membraned structures called cells. For the interaction with subatomic particles you're going to be thinking much more in the direction of atom stability and possible nuclear fusion occuring. I'm not even sure if the fluidity of the water matters, or if subatomic machinery could just pass through all tissues, or none at all. To make the most of atomic and molecular interactions I would probably recommend going nano, and most of the small scale stuff we care about is based in thosr interactions. But if there is something subatomic you're interested in accomplishing...

[BeerMug Paladin]

Picotechnology can do anything people understand nanotechnology can't do. In other words, for a story, it's a magic wand to wave in case your other magic wand isn't working.

[Phhase]

Easy matter synthesis and or rapid conversion.There's a ton you can do with that. Depending on how advanced AI is, you could create any advanced item simply by imagining it. If you can affect entanglement, then that opens up a slew of crazy option with distance no longer a limiting factor. If it can cause easy nuclear fission/fusion, then you've conquered mass/energy conversion, and can travel faster than light/time travel.

Just think about the limits of physics, and how being able to get your fingers right into the meat of their limitations would change the situation. There's many possibilities. Picotechnology is basically atomic/subatomic direct control.

[Sean Mirrsen]

I'm assuming "picotechnology" is being used here as "being able to mass-construct functioning self-contained machines on a scale within single-digit picometers", much like "nanotechnology" is typically used.

In that case, "picotech" would be, more or less, alchemy. Subatomic manipulation of matter, transmutation of elements, possibly engineered extraction of energy by "microfusion engines", machines that incite fusion in conventional matter by adjusting the interactions between particles. It's so hypothetical that you can make it do just about anything short of casually ripping holes in reality.

[Peelee]

In that case, "picotech" would be, more or less, alchemy. Subatomic manipulation of matter, transmutation of elements

That's just normal, boring old chemistry. Transmutation is really simple, you just throw in or take out protons and neutrons as needed. Bam, you've changed your element into another element.

The Nobel Prize you inevitably get for figuring out how to do it easily and at will is, of course, largely irrelevant, since you can just take some lead or something and make your own gold medal. Or dip it in hydrochloric and nitric acid and show those Nazis you didn't get it for sitting on your thumbs.

[Mastikator]

A pictometer is about a thousand times as large as a proton, a million times as a electron.
A hydrogen atom is ~0.1 nanometers, so 100 picometers.

Basically you can't do anything subatomic but you can do chemistry. Basically we already have picotechnology, we just call it chemistry.

If we're talking about tiny machines made of a small number of atoms then we're still in the nanometer scale.

The problem is that once we get to nanometer scale we run out of building blocks to actually make stuff out of.

[Peelee]

A pictometer is about a thousand times as large as a proton, a million times as a electron.
A hydrogen atom is ~0.1 nanometers, so 100 picometers.

Objection! A hydrogen atom is a proton. I also object to counting the electron.

[crayzz]

Objection! A hydrogen atom is a proton. I also object to counting the electron.

Wait, you object to counting the electron? How does that work, without the electron it's very literally not a hydrogen atom; at best it's a hydrogen cation, which is a chemically distinct species.

EDIT

And, yes, while chemistry can be described in some sense as picotechnology, that's only in the same sense in which enzymes can be described as nanotechnology: there's still plenty of room to explore there.

[Analytica]

You can swap elements of atoms in a compound "in place" without taking it apart.

[Peelee]

Wait, you object to counting the electron? How does that work, without the electron it's very literally not a hydrogen atom; at best it's a hydrogen cation, which is a chemically distinct species.

Did you know that chemist's disproved the four temperaments theory? All they had to do was demonstrate that they had no humor.

[Mechalich]

If we're talking about tiny machines made of a small number of atoms then we're still in the nanometer scale.

The problem is that once we get to nanometer scale we run out of building blocks to actually make stuff out of.

Yeah, 'picotechnology' wouldn't be able to use machines - at least not anything built out of materials extant in our universe - it would have to rely on extremely precise fields of some kind, perhaps direct manipulation of the Strong and Weak forces would allow the kind of atomic and sub-atomic manipulations that would constitute 'picotechnology.' Hypothetically, if you imagined a level of control over those two forces equivalent to the level we have over electromagnetism today that would allow you to do all sorts of things, though my physics isn't up to saying exactly what, but in fiction the answer is probably, 'whatever you want.'

[halfeye]

The guy (or gal) just wants a funky name.

Picotech sounds new. It'll be femtotech in a week. Don't worry about it, it's fiction, it's not real.

[OutOfThyme]

Honestly, just go with nanotechnology. One of the big fields of studies is how materials behave differently as a single-layer materials (or as so-called "thin films") as opposed to bulk materials (graphene/carbon nanotubes vs. graphite), which is massive.

You've also got real world research that you can branch out from, too. It's easier to start from what we've got now as a starting point than hypothetical tech that we can barely grasp.

Nanoscale science is absolutely bonkers as it stands, and going a step further is downright revolutionary in comparison to nanotechnology.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

It'll be femtotech in a week.

That could be a very good change, as an indication that the building blicks are all femtilo level or smaller, the author gets to show their research.

[Caesar]

We actually have "picotechnology" in two respects. First, we have precision detection instruments that can make measurements with picometer resolution. Second, we have the ability to manipulate materials such that inter-atomic bond-lengths are controlled with picometer resolution. As an example, you can use state of the art transmission electron or scanning tunneling microscopy (TEM and STM respectively) to observe atomic composition and bond-lengths in meta-material catalysts, designed to maximize catalytic activity through careful, controlled manipulation of atomic positions at the active sites. A fantasy pico-material like this could be a hyper-active water catalyst that almost instantly splits H20 into hydrogen and oxygen gas at room temperature. You could power your futuristic cities with this technology, but just imagine what would happen if the BBG dropped a few thousand metric tons of this material into the deepest part of the ocean.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

A fantasy pico-material like this could be a hyper-active water catalyst that almost instantly splits H20 into hydrogen and oxygen gas at room temperature. You could power your futuristic cities with this technology, but just imagine what would happen if the BBG dropped a few thousand metric tons of this material into the deepest part of the ocean.

A catalyst lowers the activation energy of a reaction, but an endothermic reaction like this still requires energy no matter how well you catalyze it. A catalyst for this reaction but not simultaneously the reverse that works well in the cold and equalized deepest parts of the ocean this would still be pretty non-trivial even with the stated technology. It's a bit easier if you're working with slightly larger molecules, enzymes can have slots that fit the reagents but not the end product, making them catalyze the reaction one way but not the other. Water is very different from separate oxygen and hydrogen, they're just all small and mobile and stuff, harder to control through lock and key mechanisms like that. And the reaction still needs to be able to absorb enough energy from the environment.

But, you know, given that this is science fiction, sure, that is a kind of thing you could do with nanotechnology/chemistry fine tuned to this level.

[Rockphed]

A catalyst lowers the activation energy of a reaction, but an endothermic reaction like this still requires energy no matter how well you catalyze it. A catalyst for this reaction but not simultaneously the reverse that works well in the cold and equalized deepest parts of the ocean this would still be pretty non-trivial even with the stated technology. It's a bit easier if you're working with slightly larger molecules, enzymes can have slots that fit the reagents but not the end product, making them catalyze the reaction one way but not the other. Water is very different from separate oxygen and hydrogen, they're just all small and mobile and stuff, harder to control through lock and key mechanisms like that. And the reaction still needs to be able to absorb enough energy from the environment.

But, you know, given that this is science fiction, sure, that is a kind of thing you could do with nanotechnology/chemistry fine tuned to this level.

What you do is you have a reaction that like [molecule] + H2O => different molecule, then you have a catalyst that splits the molecule in 2 such that one half emits an oxygen and the other half emits hydrogen. Then the two halves combine together and you do it again.

To make things safer, how about we bind that free hydrogen to a carbon for safe keeping. And to make things really neat, it will absorb ambient light to drive the process.

And, to make things really nice, we'll put it all in a bag of lipids to keep it safe. It will excrete the carbon-bound hydrogen so we can easily collect it.

[Eldan]

What you do is you have a reaction that like [molecule] + H2O => different molecule, then you have a catalyst that splits the molecule in 2 such that one half emits an oxygen and the other half emits hydrogen. Then the two halves combine together and you do it again.

To make things safer, how about we bind that free hydrogen to a carbon for safe keeping. And to make things really neat, it will absorb ambient light to drive the process.

And, to make things really nice, we'll put it all in a bag of lipids to keep it safe. It will excrete the carbon-bound hydrogen so we can easily collect it.

And to really perfect the process, we should also make the machinery self-replicating.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

And to really perfect the process, we should also make the machinery self-replicating.

And green.

That does make my point for me though: plants use solar energy, can't make the reaction go without it, and are limited in how much of the reaction they can facilitate based on the availability of energy.

I wouldn't be afraid of an evil mastermind releasing plants into the depths of the ocean.

[Rockphed]

And green.

That does make my point for me though: plants use solar energy, can't make the reaction go without it, and are limited in how much of the reaction they can facilitate based on the availability of energy.

I wouldn't be afraid of an evil mastermind releasing plants into the depths of the ocean.

I realised that I was describing something like how photosynthesis works after writing 2 sentences, so I decided to just go with it.