Smart Matter Matters

from the MEMS-that-sense-and-act dept

A number of researchers are working on the relatively new field of smart matter: tying sensors and actuators together, so that not only can a system determine what's happening, it can act on it. The article suggests that many of the initial uses for smart matter will be military applications (auto piloting tiny aircraft, for example), but that it has a number of other uses as well. The article mentions things like roads that automatically monitor their own traffic levels, and estuaries that monitor their own water purity (though, it's not clear what the "action" part of both of these examples are - they could be done, it seems, by sensors alone).

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