🚀 go-pugleaf

>I did have the interesting thought that animals can be regarded as a
>cell's solution to the problem of boldly going where no cell has gone
>before; as a way of generating a cell-friendly local environment in
>globally hostile environments and as a means of travelling vast
>distances.

This is quite an orthodox view, it is necessary to bear in mind that
the cell is merely a device serving a similar function for genes/ribosomes
etc.

>It strikes me that in many cases nanotechnology might benefit from the
>same approach for much the same reasons. For example nanomachines
>might build a temporary containment structure to fulfill their
>environmental requirements while they did the real job.

At first, however, it is more reasonable to expect the user to provide the
environment.  Except, of course, where we are talking about very small
pieces of 'environment' such as nona-scafolding etc etc.

>More relevantly
>if you wanted a large group of nanomachines to do some job for you (we
>must think of a collective noun for a group of nanomachines)

Nanomass ? - Perhaps that should mean the sum total of all the nano-scale
             devices in a given environment (akin to biomass).

How about 'swarm' or 'hive'?

>[That's essentially what the Utility Fog is... By the way I'll have
> a presentation of the U. Fog at VISION-21 (the NASA thing this March).
> --JoSH]

OK, I'm ignorant, what's 'tility fog' ?

[Fill an environment (say, the inside of your house) with cell-sized
 robots.  They are able to simulate the presence (or absence) of 
 objects by grabbing each other in patterns -- sort of a 3D CRT.
 Maybe I ought to put a short description in the FAQ...
 --JoSH]