Neil Gershenfeld
= Neil Gershenfeld, research into personal fabricators:
Bio
Professor Neil Gershenfeld is the Director of MIT's Center for Bits and Atoms, an interdisciplinary initiative that is broadly exploring how the content of information relates to its physical representation, from atomic nuclei to global networks. CBA's intellectual community and research resources cut across traditional divisions of inquiry by disciplines and length scales in order to bring together the best features of the bits of new digital worlds with the atoms of the physical world. Dr. Gershenfeld has also led the Media Lab's Things That Think industrial research consortium, which pioneered moving computation out of conventional computers and into the rest of the world, and worked with the Media Lab Asia on appropriate advanced technology for global development.
His own laboratory studies fundamental mechanisms for manipulating information (which led to the development of molecular logic used to implement the first complete quantum computation, and to analog circuits that can efficiently perform optimal digital operations), integrates these ideas into everyday objects such as furniture (seen in the New York's Museum of Modern Art and used in automobile safety systems), and applies them in collaborations with partners ranging from developing a computerized cello for Yo-Yo Ma and stage for the Flying Karamazov Brothers to instrumentation used by rural Indian villagers and Sami herders.
Beyond his many publications and patents, Prof. Gershenfeld is the author of the popular books "Fab" and "When Things Start To Think,"
(bio from http://web.media.mit.edu/~neilg/neil/longbio.html)
Discussion
Personal Fabrication technology
"What if you could design and produce your own products, in your own home, with a machine that can be used to make almost anything? Imagine if you didn't have to wait for a company to sell the product you wanted but could use your own personal fabricator to create it instead. Neil Gershenfeld, Director of MIT's Center for Bits and Atoms, believes that personal fabricators will allow us to do just that and revolutionize our world.
His most recent book, FAB: The Coming Revolution on Your Desktop—From Personal Computers to Personal Fabrication, explores the ability to design and produce your own products, in your own home, with a machine that combines consumer electronics with industrial tools. Such machines, Personal fabricators, offer the promise of making almost anything-including new personal fabricators and as a result revolutionize the world just as personal computers did a generation ago." (http://www.itconversations.com/shows/detail460.html)
More Information
Fab Labs at MIT, at http://cba.mit.edu/projects/fablab