On Sat, 28 Aug 1999, my inner geek wrote:
> Having thoroughly established that I'm a confused layperson in
> technology areas, may I humbly request an explanation of the "active
> shield" concept mentioned in "Engines of Creation?"
I haven't read this in a while, but I think an active shield is one that response actively to a threat. Like a fabric that is very soft under normal conditions, but upon sensing a sharply penetrating force, becomes as strong as steel. It is kind of like the airbag in a car. This could also be done with a flying swarm of nanobots in close proximity to your body. These are discussed a little bit in Nanomedicine.
>
> Once it is known that nanomachines are in use in a particular product
> or person or object, what is to prevent the object from being frozen
> then destructively scanned by SPM/AFM for structure?
> In other words, if Johnny Mnemonic has a nice nano vr system in his
> head, wouldn't there be many parties who wan't Johnny's head on a
> silver platter, to study the hardware inside?
Reverse engineering nanotech? Possibly, its done fairly frequently in the microproccessor and software industries. But I suspect if you really want to keep the design secure, it can be done. Since most nanotech designs are likely to be open source, then its a rare piece of nanotech you are going to want to take apart.
Robert