MIT's Technology
Review has identified 10 emerging areas of technology that will
soon have a profound impact on the economy and how we live and work.
Regular readers of Global Future Report™
know I am a sucker for lists of things that matter. I
even write lists of my own, e.g. my "Ten
Tips for Harnessing the Future" or the four forces converging
to alter global telecommunications in "Calling
the Future."
To launch the New Millennium the January/February
issue of Technology
Review, MIT's magazine of innovation, focuses on "The Technology
Review Ten" - "10 emerging areas of technology that will soon have
a profound impact on the economy and how we live and work."
For each, one innovator's work is highlighted.
Drum roll, please! The ten emerging technologies
that will change the world are:
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Brain-Machine Interfaces -
In essence, researchers try both to understand how the brain
works and to use this knowledge to implant electrodes in specific
parts of the brain to permit control of computers, robotic arms,
or other artificial devices designed to restore lost sensory
and motor functions. |
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Flexible Transistors - Silicon
does not bend readily, so a new class of hybrid materials are
being developed that marry the speed of inorganic compounds
with the flexibility of organic polymers. They have the
advantage of being able to be dissolved and printed onto paper
or plastic as if they were ink particles. |
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Data Mining - Ever get an
e-mail from amazon.com suggesting a book that relates to an
earlier one you ordered from them? You have been the subject
of data mining, which is nothing more than the extraction of
meaningful information and patterns from huge data sets. |
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Digital Rights Management
- Think Napster! The Internet permits the sharing
of digital content far and wide at little cost. But originators
of the content - articles, data, graphics, songs - may lose
control of their intellectual property. Digital rights
management combines encryption with payment software to
restrict the distribution of the content within limits proposed
by the content's originator. |
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Biometrics - Biometrics
identify individuals by specific biological traits such as fingerprints,
retinal patterns, or facial features. Biometric pattern
recognition software will eventually replace PINs and passwords
to provide secure computing. |
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Natural Language Processing
- In a huge leap from today's speech recognition or generation
software, natural language processing will allow computers to
converse easily with us and to translate smoothly from one language
to another. |
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Microphotonics -
Photonic crystals reflect various wavelengths of light almost
perfectly, giving them the ability to create optical circuits
to move and process data at the speed of light. The transmitting
capability depends both on the photon's wavelength and the crystal's
design. |
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Untangling Code
- Computer code is notoriously complex, making the simplest
changes difficult at best. Riding to the rescue is an
"aspect" - a new category within a programming language such
as Java. It takes account of crosscutting capabilities
linking different parts of the code. The aspect essentially
ties it all together, so that when the aspect is changed, the
change ripples through the entire crosslinked code automatically. |
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Robot Design -
Using adaptive algorithms and heuristic tools, robots can be
taught how to design other robots to work flexibly at different
tasks and in different environment. |
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Microfluidics -
With microscopic amounts of fluid in equally microscopic valves
and pumps made from soft silicone rubber, high speed analysis
of DNA or sorting of cells is made possible. |
You may wish to compare MIT's list to George
Washington University's "The
Top 10 Emerging Technologies" or Red Herring's "Top
Ten Trends 2001" that I wrote about in recent months.
Also view MIT's
updated list for 2003.
Read the whole article in Technology
Review, January/February, 2001, issue.
