THE AUTHORITY ON THE FUTURE OF TECHNOLOGY September/October 2007 The iPhone, www.technologyreview.com Cracked Open p30 Can a Pill Extend Life? p78
MIT NEWS Ellen Swallow Richards pM12
Contents Volume 110, Number 5
Features 47 The TR35 Technology Review presents its seventh class of outstanding innovators under the age of 35. These driven, creative people will alter the state of medicine, computing, communications, and energy. Their work represents the future of technology. 78 The Enthusiast A controversial biologist at Harvard claims he can extend life span and treat diseases of aging. He just may be right. By David Ewing Duncan 84 Essay: Letter to a Young Scientist In this excerpt from his newly released memoir, the famous biologist tells By James Watson Cover illustration by Oliver Hibert of his role in determining the structure of DNA.
7 Contributors Hack Reviews Letters 8 30 The iPhone 98 Higher Games 10 From the Editor Apple s phone sets a new standard, It s been 10 years since IBM s Deep but not with wholly unique hardware. Blue beat Garry Kasparov in chess. Forward By Daniel Turner What did the match mean? By Daniel C. Dennett 19 Mapping Censorship When it comes to Internet censorship, Q&A 100 Electric Cars 2.0 China and Iran top the list 32 Alieu Conteh Plug-in hybrids could bring gas-free 20 Shopping Search How an African entrepreneur put commutes. But will they get made? A cell-phone service guides users to cell phones in Congo By Kevin Bullis nearby bargains—sometimes By Jason Pontin 102 Patent Law Gets Saner 20 Portable Hurricane The U.S. Supreme Court has sent a Machine will help Florida update its Notebooks clear message to “patent trolls.” building codes for storms By Scott Feldmann 36 Protecting Security and Privacy 21 Nano Curry The ubiquitous computational Demo Encased curcumin could be a drug devices of tomorrow will pose risks. 21 Seeing Signs of Diabetes By Tadayoshi Kohno 104 Illuminating Silicon Optical devices made of silicon Molecular tracers spot the disease 36 The Future of Manufacturing could transform communications 22 Silicon-Based Spintronics Self-assembly is the key to building networks and computing. First-of-its-kind computing prototype complex nano devices. By Kate Greene By Babak A. Parviz 22 Self-Healing Plastic A material repairs itself multiple times 37 Cells by Design From the Labs
24 Wireless Recharging What synthetic biology most needs is 108 Nanotechnology MIT researchers send power two a better way to synthesize DNA. By J. Christopher Anderson 109 Biotechnology meters with no wires 110 Information Technology 24 Invisible Ink from Xerox Cartridge works in standard printers Photo Essay 5 Years Ago in TR 26 Featured Startup: Vlingo 38 Body Parts, New and Improved Company s voice-recognition Amputee athletes are getting faster 112 Please Don t Give Me a Break! interface unlocks the mobile Web and stronger. Catching up with Max Levchin And more ... By Emily Singer By Michael Patrick Gibson
2 CONTENTS TECHNOLOGY REVIEW september/october 2007 TechnologyReview.com What s New on Our Website technologyreview.com/tr35 technologyreview.com/prostheses lar biolo gist who discovered the anti- Learn more about the TR35 honorees This issue of the magazine features a aging gene sir2 more than a decade on our website. See Josh Bongard s beautiful photo essay on amputee ath- ago, and Christoph Westphal, CEO robots explore new terrain in com- letes who use a range of new, sophis- and cofounder (with Sinclair) of puter simulations (p. 74), or toy with ticated prostheses (p. 38). Online, Sirtris Pharmaceuticals, the article a virtual nanogenerator based on you ll i nd video of the athletes in is an excellent technical introduc- Xudong Wang s research (p. 72). action. See Rudy Garcia-Tolson cycle tion to this exciting i eld of research. You ll also i nd mini-documentaries using a prosthetic knee, and watch about the TR35 Innovator of the Hugh Herr easily attach, adjust, Year, David Berry, and Humani- and walk on his powered ankle. tarian of the Year, Tapan Parikh. technologyreview.com/sirtuins This issue features a proi le of David Sinclair, a controversial Harvard biolo gist who is testing drugs to i ght aging (p. 78). Online, we ve posted an explanation of the science technologyreview.com/iphone behind antiaging genes and how a This month, Technology Review new class of compounds might acti- takes the Apple iPhone apart and vate them. Written by Sinclair and explains what s inside (p. 30). Check several of his colleagues, including out our website for an animated Leonard Guarente, the MIT molecu- look at the phone s hardware.
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TECHNOLOGYwww.thinkfi REVIEW september re.com/october 2007 For more information contact csommers@thinkfiTECHNOLOGYREVIEW re.com. .COM 3 Editor in Chief and Publisher Corporate Advertising Sales China, Hong Kong, Philippines, Jason Pontin and Thailand Chief Financial Offi cer Senior Vice President and Herb Moskowitz Rick Crowley Director of Advertising Sales Editorial [email protected] Chief Operating Offi cer Maureen Elmaleh 852-28-38-87-02 Editor James Coyle [email protected] David Rotman 212-419-2823 Japan Executive Assistant Deputy Editor Shigeru Kobayashi Nate Nickerson Leila Snyder New York and Northeast [email protected] 813-3261-4591 Art Director Manager of Information Technology Johanna Zottarelli-Duffe Lee Caulfi eld Colby Wheeler [email protected] 212-419-2824 South Korea S. Y. Jo Chief Correspondent Marketing [email protected] David Talbot New England and Midwest Senior Vice President, Business 82-27-39-78-40 Senior Editor Development and Marketing Barry Echavarria [email protected] Erika Jonietz Kathleen Kennedy Taiwan 603-924-7586 Keith Lee Senior Editor, MIT News Senior Graphic Designer [email protected] Alice Dragoon Mid-Atlantic and Southeast Matthew Bouchard 886-2-25-23-82-68 Clive Bullard Biotechnology and Marketing Communications Manager [email protected] Life Sciences Editor Stephanie Corner Emily Singer 845-231-0846 Advertising Services Sales and Marketing Coördinator [email protected] Information Technology and Amy Lammers Northwest and Southwest 617-475-8004 Computer Science Editor Patrick Viera Advertising Services Coördinator Kate Greene [email protected] Media Kit Nanotechnology and David A. Schmidt 415-659-2982 www.technologyreview.com/media Materials Science Editor Kevin Bullis Consumer Marketing Northwest Steve Thompson Technology Review Associate Editor Circulation Director [email protected] One Main Street, 7th Floor Katherine Bourzac Heather Holmes 415-435-4678 Cambridge MA 02142 Copy Chief Fulfi llment Manager Tel: 617-475-8000 Linda Lowenthal Tina Bellomy France Fax: 617-475-8043 Philippe Marquezy Copy Editor Customer Service Coördinator [email protected] Larry Hardesty Karen Stallone 33-1-4270-0008 Research Editor Jessica B. Baker Finance Germany Michael Hanke Editorial Assistant Accountant [email protected] Michael P. Gibson Letitia Trecartin 49-511-5352-167 Assistant Designer Angela Tieri Board of Directors Europe Reid Ashe, Jerome I. Friedman, Anthony Fitzgerald Editorial Intern Elizabeth A. Garvin, Robert M. mail@afi tzgerald.co.uk Erica Naone Metcalfe, Theresa M. Stone, 44-1488-680623 Production Consultant Sheila E. Widnall, Ann J. Wolpert James LaBelle Contributing Editors Relaunch Fund Simson Garfi nkel, Mark Williams Millennial Patron Robert M. Metcalfe TechnologyReview.com Centennial Patrons Vice President, Online Steve Kirsch, DuWayne David Foucher J. Peterson Jr. Managing Editor Rachel Ross Customer service and subscription inquiries the authority on the future of Graphic Designer Technology Review, Inc., Conrad Warre National: 800-877-5230 technology, identifi es emerging technologies and analyzes their impact International: 386-447-6352 Web Producer for technology leaders. Technology Review publishes Technology Review www.technologyreview.com/ Brittany Sauser customerservice magazine (the oldest technology magazine in the world, founded in Web Copy Editor Permissions: 978-750-8400 1899) and the daily website TechnologyReview.com; it also produces Nell Beram Reprints: 717-399-1900 x118 live events such as the Emerging Technologies Conference. Technology Web Developers MIT Records: 617-253-8270 Shaun Calhoun, Michael Callahan, (alums only) Review is an independent media company owned by the Massachusetts Sarah Redman Institute of Technology. The views expressed in our various publications De Technologia non multum scimus. Scimus autem, quid nobis placeat. and at our events are often not shared by MIT.
4 TECHNOLOGY REVIEW september/october 2007
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Josh Linkner Founder and CEO ePrize michigan.org/upperhand I am the future of technology.
MARY FINLAY DEPUTY CHIEF INFORMATION OFFICER, PARTNERS HEALTHCARE SYSTEM
Mary is responsible for managing the 1,300 IT and telecom professionals who support Partners Health- care, a huge institution comprising 10 hospitals and facilities in the Boston area—including two of the nation s fi nest hospitals, Massachusetts General and Brigham and Women s. She says wants to “bring the best technology to our physicians so that they ve got the information they need, and sophisticated support for the clinical systems upon which they depend.” Technology Review is the magazine she reads to learn which emerging technologies will help her do her job better: “I love Technology Review because it really www.technologyreview.com/reader looks to the future.” James Watson was Stephen S. Hall, for this year s TR35 awarded a Nobel package, proi led David Berry, our Technology Review Prize in 1962 for his Innovator of the Year (p. 48). Though is now part in discovering Berry, a Harvard-trained MD, has the double-helical done a few dif erent things since structure of DNA—a earning his bachelor s degree from mobile story recounted here MIT in 2000—he developed a treat- (“Letter to a Young Scientist,” p. 84) ment for stroke and worked on a new in an excerpt from his new book, approach to cancer therapy—he is now Avoid Boring People: And Other Les- concentrating, in his sons from a Life in Science. The book, work at Flagship says, Watson, “is my autobiographi- Ventures, on geneti- cal romp through academia, including cally engineering lessons learned that have helped keep microbes to produce me, at 79, more alive than dead.” biofuels. His ideas Watson is the author of Molecular are at the heart of Biology of the Gene and The Double Flagship -backed LS9, a Californina- Helix. He is now chancellor of the based renewable-petroleum company. Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. “I was impressed by David,” Hall says. “He conveys a very low-key form Daniel C. Dennett is a philosopher of energy and high-minded restless- who has long argued that artii cial ness, yet the breadth of his interests intelligence might one day produce is unusually wide. While he was still machines that can be said to be con- attending medical school at Harvard, scious. In this issue, he discusses AI he organized a fairly high-powered and chess: it was 10 roundtable at MIT on alternative fuel years ago that Deep technologies. That says a lot about how Blue beat world broadly he approaches innovation.” champion Garry Hall is the author of i ve books Kasparov (“Higher about contemporary science. His most Games,” p. 98). recent, Size Matters, was published Bookmark it today! “We re a long way last year and examines the disad- mobile.technology from human-level AI,” says Dennett, vantages of being short. Hall writes review.com “but the philosophical arguments frequently for the New York Times against achieving this are all bogus. Magazine, National Geographic, and Technology Review, the author- Could we design and build a robotic a number of other magazines. bird that could catch insects on the l y ity on the future of technology, and land safely on a twig? It would Oliver Hibert illustrated this issue s introduces cutting-edge content be an incredibly dii cult tour de force cover. “I had a fun time designing formatted for your mobile device. of engineering, but not impossible in this,” he reports. “Listening to music With streamlined navigation and principle. The same goes for human- is an essential part audio versions of daily stories, level AI. We may never achieve it, but of the way I design, you re never far away from the only because it will be too expensive and the music of latest technology news and in- and frivolous to try. We can learn choice for this depth analysis. what we need to know by building project was 60s simpler models.” psychedelia and 80s Dennett is the author of Con- electro-pop. Good sciousness Explained, Darwin s times.” Hibert works in many media, Dangerous Idea, and Breaking the but painting is his chief love. He has Spell. At Tufts University, he is a had shows in museums and galleries University Professor and codirector around the world, and he currently of the Center for Cognitive Studies. lives in Phoenix, AZ.
TECHNOLOGY REVIEW september/october 2007 LETTERS 7 Letters
Second Life whom we have not provided the means Several experts and writers equated I ve been following the virtual world for input or output that it would need operational simplicity with minimal called Second Life for some time, so it to signal to us that it is conscious. Or functions, and several cited the iPod was a pleasure to read Wade Roush s maybe it s speaking “Chinese” to an as an example of gaining simplicity thoughtful and intelligent cover story “English” world or broadcasting radio by avoiding feature creep. But the (“Second Earth,” July/August 2007). to a television world. history of the iPod is feature creep The piece benei ted greatly from the I think we d better find a more itself. It started out as a music player. fact that your writer entered into the general concept of consciousness than Now it plays music, podcasts, video, life of the community he was trying to Gelernter s so that, at a minimum, and games; it can act as a stopwatch understand. we ll recognize that aliens have landed or alarm clock, show you the time in I m sure you ll receive some sple- if they ever do. other world cities, maintain your con- netic, sarcastic criticism of the piece Stanley D. Young tacts and calendar, show photos, allow from someone disgusted by the very Fort Collins, CO you to read text i les, and serve as a idea of a Second Life. Unlike Roush, backup hard drive. Why does it remain though, your critic will almost certainly I side with the anticognitivists (and simple to use? Because all the func- have spent no time in acquiring one. thus David Gelernter). AI software tions work the same way. The user Michael Parsons running on von Neumann machines needs to learn only one rule about the Editor, CNET.co.uk will never be conscious, and without interface and can apply it to every func- London, England consciousness there can be no experi- tion on the device. ence, human or otherwise. Believing Victor Riley Artifi cial Intelligence that somehow consciousness will arise Point Roberts, WA In his essay arguing against the possi- like a deus ex machina on your Pen- bility of producing conscious machines tium is an article of religious faith. Changing Human Nature (“Artii cial Intelligence Is Lost in the Still, while AI software cannot rep- I read with interest the essay by phi- Woods,” July/August 2007), is Yale licate consciousness, networks of arti- losopher Roger Scruton (“The Trouble computer science professor David i cial neurons have considerably more with Knowledge,” May/June 2007), Gelernter arguing against artificial promise. Consider machines being since I enjoy seeing things in new ways intelligence or artificial humanity? built by Kwabena Boahen s group at and respect philosophers for their Intelligence does not require all the Stanford or earlier by Carver Mead s penetrating insight and clear logic. But human interactions with the world or student Misha Mahowald at Caltech. I found neither in Scruton s piece. emotions that he lists, unless there is There are also hybrids in which real Scruton fears that future technology a particular need to provide those for neural circuits are emulated in very will enable men and machines to inter- the intended application. large-scale integration (VLSI): Paul act in increasingly intimate ways and Consciousness is hard to dei ne. Rhodes s group at Evolved Machines eventually merge to the degree that Maybe someone should make a in Palo Alto is working on that, as is human nature itself is altered. He is replacement for the Turing test, Alan Theodore Berger s group at the Uni- terrii ed of this possibility. Turing s suggestion that if a computer versity of Southern California. But what, exactly, is so great about can answer questions the same way a Digital computers are so second human nature that he is so scared of human would, then it can be consid- millennium. As my MIT classmate its changing? One need only read a ered intelligent. A Helen Keller test, Ray Kurzweil might say, “Plug that sili- newspaper to see, not only that human perhaps: it may be possible, after all, con retina into your optic nerve, and nature is deeply l awed, but also that it that there is or will be a computer in you won t know the dif erence.” is human nature not to need a reason existence that is conscious, but for Robert Blum to believe something that makes you Menlo Park, CA feel good; it is human nature to believe whatever superstitions you were taught How to contact us Good Design as a child. Scruton certainly seems to. E-mail [email protected] Your design-focused May/June 2007 When he starts to mention God, and Write Technology Review, One Main Street, issue was very interesting and thought- refers to the Fall of Adam, I suspect that 7th Floor, Cambridge MA 02142 provoking, but I think it missed an nobody is going to get much of a clear Fax 617-475-8043 Please include your address, telephone number, opportunity to focus attention on the and rational discussion from him. and e-mail address. Letters may be edited for most pervasive problems of electronic- Don Dilworth both clarity and length. product design. East Boothbay, ME
8 LETTERS TECHNOLOGY REVIEW september/october 2007