Serenade

I have this fantasy/sci-fi world, but I dont want to make it too fantasy, ie: potions, magic, etc. Instead, I wanted to incorporate nanomachines, a la Metal Gear Solid, when someone gets hurt. For instance, when someone breaks they're arm, they get injected with nanomachines which fix the problem. Now, here's the thing. Of course I can't make it where, if someone dies, they can just get pumped with nanomachines to fix the problem. So when that question arrives in my piece, I explain it saying that too many nanomachines in the body will cause the white blood cells and immune system to attack them and the person will die anyway. Does that sound like a plausible explanation? Or would the immune system attack no matter how many nanomachines were injected?

Hodge

Since they aren't attacking the body, nanomachines would probaby cause an allergic reaction. Not all people would develop allergies to them, but some would.

Serenade

So, would the people be okay? How serious do you think the allergies would be?

Hodge

Pretty damn bad, I'd say. You know how bee stings can be deadly to people with allergies? Same with nanomites.

However, the size of the machines matters as well. If they were as small as viruses, they could go about their business without incurring the wrath of your immune system. A few might be lost to wandering macrophages, but no organized response. Modern nanomachines aren't that small, though. They're still fairly large, about the size of a red blood cell and not functional enough to really do anything.

__________________
Science

Serenade

Hmmm... And that's where the technology advanced city in my story comes in. The one that has made nanomachines small enough to creep around in the body. Thanks. Now I just gotta think of how the hell they made nanos that small...

Mada

Considering how white blood cells work I don't think they could destroy anything too big. I mean like the difference between the iron in your blood and the size of a pencil point. A working nanomachine would probably be...uh excreted not dissolved in teh blood or destroyed by white blood cells.

Serenade

So you're saying the people would sweat em out? But would it be before the nanos had a chance to begin work?

Mada

I think they might crap, sweat, puke, urinate, or bleed them out. I think they wouldn't work on repairing or hurting the digestive system because it would take maybe less than an hour for them to be digested. In the bloodstream they might eventually dissolve, once i got a rock in my knee and that dissolved. They couldnt go deep into bones because they'd probably get stuck in the marrow. If they are trying to do damage then theyd probably be injected into teh heart. If they needed to heal a infection they could do that before they dissolved. They migth work on small fractures too. They could survive in the eye probably unless they are so small the immunity system would kill them. Of course, tehre could be a fake dead flu virus or something also injected so that the immune system won't be able to handle both.

Serenade

No the nanomachines are only meant to heal, as in a fractured bone or puncture wound. And what if I create some kind of material/metal that the nanomachines are comprised of? One that can withstand the assault of the blood as they worked?

Mada

I suppose something like platinum or titanium or crystal could survive. At first I thought that would be too expensive but then i realized its small so that dosent matter. As for a puncture wound, they could probably act as those cells that make scabs (i forgot the name I learned it in like 6th Grade science), but act faster. Of course even if they were put in teh human before the cut, if the blow was to the heart they might not be able to do it fast enough. You could use that for a kind of small twist or just say they can act fast. (btw i explained for a bone in the other post i made i edited it before i posted this)

Hodge

Nanomachines in the bloodstream would end up getting eaten by macrophages. They wouldn't "dissolve" on their own; macrophages are gargantuan cells that are made for the specific purpose of gobbling up foreign objects in the body (and dragging off viruses or bacteria to B-cells for antibody production). If they're made out of some fancy, tough material like diamond or titanium then you have the problem of creating them efficiently and cheaply...

And injecting a dead flu virus into the body wouldn't keep an immune response from affecting other foreign objects. The immune system is a very powerful, very mobile system. Most of the time when someone has immuno-deficiency problems it's because something's keeping the system from responding, not because it's been exhausted.

__________________
Science

Serenade

Yes, that is a lot of diamond. However, with a little creativity, I can definitely make it happen. Maybe the city's built around a diamond vein? Maybe they're supplied all their money through multiple global sponsorship and trade? Who knows? However, if everyone agrees that diamond or titanium nanomachines would be able to do their thing, then my problem's solved.

Hodge

It's not very much diamond at all. They're tiny machines.

But how do you cut another diamond? With diamond. Imagine trying to produce complex machines smaller than a cell with diamond tools. A laser probably wouldn't be able to cut it.

Read Michael Crichton's Prey. It provides a very realistic method for production of nanomachines and is a very good read to boot. In fact, Crichton is always good to turn to when dealing with technology, because he does a ton of research to make sure his information is accurate.

But wouldn't really matter what they were made of anyways. They're nanomachines, you produce millions of them. You'd lose hundreds, maybe thousands to wandering macrophages. It's not an organized immune response, so it isn't like they'd be fighting off cells at every turn.

__________________
Science

Serenade

I have read Prey, and that's kind of where I got the idea from. However, I don't want to completely bite his style, so I'm trying to think of other ways. And maybe advanced laser technology can do the trick?

Edit: Oh and I meant diamond as in the total amount needed to mass produce the nanomachines.

Hodge

Using E. Coli to produce nano assemblers to produce the actual bots is probably the best bet, although in a more advanced society nanobots could conceivably be produced in factories by other nanobots.

I don't think lasers would work on diamond, though. I could be wrong, but it seems to me that diamond would refract the laser light rather than attempt to absorb it (and thus be cut). You might do some research on the MASER and see if that would work, but I'm thinking it wouldn't.

__________________
Science