Term of the Moment
5G
Definition: nanobot
A minuscule robot that can be injected into the bloodstream to deliver medicine directly to the appropriate cells. Expected to change medicine forever by the 2040s, nanobot experiments are taking place in mice as of 2026. These are preliminary trials that are very elementary in comparison to what may transpire in the future.
Fixing One Cell at a Time
In the 1966 movie Fantastic Voyage, a submarine and crew are shrunk to microscopic size and injected into the bloodstream of a patient to save him. Truly science fiction; however, in the 2010s, Rutgers University scientists stated that nano-sized robots injected into the bloodstream can administer a drug to an infected cell. With a carbon nanotube body and a biomolecular motor, its peptide limbs orient its position. Composed of DNA and proteins, the robot is easily removed from the body. (Image courtesy of the Bio-Nano Robotics team at Rutgers University.)