Nanotechnology in the Arts

Artists

Alexa
Alexa Smith is an artist that is fascinated by the field of nanotechnology and has therefore focused her art in that field. Her works of nanotechnology-inspired art are available at: http://www.alexaart.com/ArtMain.html

Nanomedicine Art Gallery
The Nanomedicine Art Gallery contains an array of visual artworks from a variety of artists that depicts their different conceptions of how medical nanorobots and nanomedical devices and systems might appear. This website is available at: http://www.foresight.org/Nanomedicine/Gallery/index.html

Nanotechnology Art Gallery
The Nanotechnology Art Gallery webpage contains sample nanotechnology artworks from different artists with a link to each artist¡s currently displayed nanotechnology artwork. This website is available at: http://nanotech-now.com/nanotechnology-art-gallery.htm

Nanotechnology: The Exhibition
Nanotechnology: The Exhibition, a collaboration of the Miami University Nanotechnology Center and the Miami University Art Museum, shows the influence and inspiration that nanotechnology has on art as well as art on nanotechnology. Links are provided to allow online viewing of the statements and artworks of five contemporary scientist/artists that are shown. Included in this exhibition, are artworks by Buckminster Fuller, the visionary thinker, which involved geodesic domes which were reminiscent of patterns of subsequently discovered stable assemblies of carbon atoms. This website is available at: http://www.fna.muohio.edu/amu/nano/catalog.html

Novels

Kevin Anderson
Assemblers of Infinity
(Bantam Books: New York 1993)
A scientist is sent to the moon to investigate the alien “nanocritters,” tiny self-replicating machines, that were discovered constructing something inside a crater on the moon.

Kevin J. Anderson and Elizabeth Hand
X-Files: Antibodies
(HarperPrism: New York 1997)
Two investigators search for answers as to whether a disease ridden body was a result of microscopic bio-machines that went out of control.

Stephen Baxter
Moonseed
(HarperCollins Publishers: New York 1999)
A ten-dimensional nano-virus that has destroyed Venus now threatens Earth. The protagonists try to save the Earth and search for a refuge for humanity if Earth will be destroyed by this virus.

Greg Bear
Blood Music
(I Books: New York 2002)
A geneticist injects himself with genetically modified human leukocytes which have the ability to self-replicate, which initially improves his physical attributes, but they eventually escape his body into society, intent on reinventing humanity.

Benjamin Bova
Moonwar
(HarperCollins Publishers: New York 1998)
A fledgling lunar colony made possible by nanotechnology, fights for its survival both militarily and politically when it defies a UN directive that outlawed nanotechnology.

Benjamin Bova
The Precipice
(Tor Books: New York 2001)
Two industrialists send an experimental spaceship, powered by innovations in fusion and nanotechnology, to the asteroid belt to explore the feasibility of transferring the heavy industries into outer space to prevent further damage to Earth resulting from the greenhouse effect caused by the pollution from the heavy industries.

Jeffrey A. Carver
From a Changeling Star
(Bantam: New York 1998)
An astronomer that is infected with nano-agents which alter his appearance, memory, and DNA, searches out to discover why he was so infected.

C. J. Cherryh
Hammerfull
(HarperCollins Publishers: New York 2002)
Marak, a warrior considered mad because of the nanos which infected him and fellow madmen which caused them to hear voices and see visions calling them to go to the silver tower in the east, is given the task of saving the Ila, the powerful dictator made eternal because of nanomachines in her body, and his world as he knows it, by bringing them to that very same silver tower.

C. J. Cherryh
Forge of Heaven
(HarperCollins Publishers: New York 2004)
A sequel to Hammerfull, a satellite orbits the planet to prevent the illicit nanotechnology and “nanoceles” that are on the planet from spreading.

Michael Crichton
Prey
(HarperCollins Publishers: New York 2002)
Nanomachines, smaller than dust specks, have been programmed with a predator/prey software of an unemployed programmer which allowed the nanomachines to reproduce, evolve, and learn new behaviors. These nanomachines escape and begin to hunt other life forms, and the programmer of the software is called in to rein in the nanomachines.

Jack Dann, ed. and Gardner Dozois, ed.
Nanotech
(Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated: New York 1998)
An anthology of science fiction stories related to the possibilities and potentials of nanotechnology, including stories by writers like Greg Bear, Stephen Baxter, Nancy Kress, and Greg Egan.

Elton Elliot, ed.
Nanodreams
(Baen Books: Riverdale, New York 1995)
An anthology of science fiction stories focused on the potential and promise of nanotechnology, including stories by writers like Poul Anderson and Greg Bear.

Michael Flynn
The Nanotech Chronicles
(Baen Books: Riverdale, New York 1991)
Compilation of short science fiction stories exploring the possibilities of nanotechnology.

James Alan Gardner
Hunted
(HarperCollins Publishers: New York 2000)
Edward York, a member of the Outward Fleet Explorer Corps, is sent away on a Navy starship in which all other crew and passengers die in the same instant, leaving Edward alone and trapped with unknown, destructive nanotechnology. After informing the Navy about the danger, of which the Navy is curiously apathetic, he discovers that he has been a victim of a conspiracy and, together with the help of another Explorer, frees himself and some alien friends from the danger that ensues.

Kathleen Ann Goonan
Queen City Jazz
(Doherty, Tom Associates, LLC: New York 1995)
In a post-nanotech plagued world, the protagonist seeks out the ability to revive dead people with the use of nanotechnology that had initially provided for humanity a near utopian existence.

Kathleen Ann Goonan
Mississippi Blues
(Doherty, Tom Associates, LLC: New York 1999)
The heroine of the first novel (above) leads a group of refugees on a huge nanotech riverboat to the refuge city of New Orleans.

Kathleen Ann Goonan
Crescent City Rhapsody
(HarperCollins Publishers: New York 2001)
A murder victim revived through nanotechnology seeks to transform the world into a better place using nanotechnology in a beneficial way.

Kathleen Ann Goonan
Light Music
(HarperCollins Publishers: New York 2002)
After pirates had damaged a sentient city, placing its ability into becoming a spacecraft in peril, some inhabitants went searching for a guidance system which would allow it to become a space craft. After forgetting their search they meet beings mutated because of nanotechnology.

Dean Koontz
By the Light of the Moon
(Bantam: New York 2003)
After being forcibly injected with a nanotechnology-produced substance containing nanobots, three people develop supernatural powers, which, for reasons unbeknownst to them, make them fugitives. Together they come to grips with their new abilities and use it to prevail against their pursuers.

John Robert Marlow
Nano
(St. Martin's Press: New York 2004)
After the assassination of the billionaire who funded his nanotechnology research, the scientist uses that same technology to prevail against the evil U.S. government agents that want to steal the technology to maintain the evil status quo.

Paul J. McAuley
Red Dust
(William Morrow: New York 1994)
A young technician is infected with a nanovirus which gives him astonishing powers. He uses those powers to rescue civilization from chaos.

Wil McCarthy
Murder in the Solid State
(Tor Books: New York 1998)
A nanotechnological chemist battles for his life after he develops nanoware that renders the Vandergroot Molecular Sniffer, a machine that can detect molecules associated with almost any form of illegal activity, useless.

Ian McDonald
Terminal CafØ
(Bantam, Reprint Edition: New York 1995)
Thanks to nanotechnology, dead people are resurrected, but they must serve the mortally living in gratitude for being resurrected, and they revolt.

L. E. Modesitt, Jr.
Gravity Dreams
(Tor Books: New York 2000)
Labeled a “demon” because of his physiologically enhanced powers as a result of a rouge nanotechnology infection, Tyndel is forced to escape his theocratic homeland for a neighboring country inhabited by “demons” that dwell in a society of technological wonders enhanced by nanotechnology. There, Tyndel struggles to adapt to a new way of life in a society that accepts the superhuman as “natural.”

L. E. Modesitt, Jr.
The Octagonal Raven
(Tor Books: New York 2002)
Daryn Alwyn, a member of the wealthy elite and thus a beneficiary of Àpreselected” genetic advantages and nanotech augmentation, finds himself and others like him the target of assassinations. His investigations to discover those behind these assassination attempts uncover a conspiracy attempt to take over the world.

Linda Nagata
Limit of Vision
(Doherty, Tom Associates, LLC: New York 2002)
In a world where sentient nanotech lifeforms and its technology are outlawed, they search ways to persevere and survive.

Linda Nagata
Deception Well
(Bantam Books, Incorporated: New York 1996)
Left by his father in the only inhabitable city at the time, empowered by nanotechnology that causes his body to exude psychoactive enzymes that can transform anyone into his willing and loving supplicant, an adolescent leads a rebellion of youths against the city¡s elders.

Linda Nagata
The Bohr Maker
(Bantam Books, Incorporated: New York 1995)
The Bohr Maker, an outlawed microscopic factory full of self-replicating machines programmed to transform a human host into a genius-level nanotech engineer, was stolen and subsequently found by a poverty-stricken woman. This changes the destiny of everyone in unanticipated ways.

Karl Schroeder
Ventus
(Tor Books: New York 2000)
Following a successful terraformation of the planet Ventus via a complex nanosystem in preparation of a coming human colony, for some unknown reason the system refused to let the humans, once they arrived, to employ the technology, forcing them to use Middle Ages technology.

Charles Sheffield
The Cyborg from Earth: A Jupiter Novel
(St. Martin¡s Press: New York 1999)
Despite the protagonist¡s demonstrated unfitness for military duty, he is sent to the Messina Dust Cloud, home to a human population that has been illegally experimenting with nanotechnology to create warrior cyborgs, to deal with the warrior cyborgs. He discovers why he was sent before he becomes the pawn in someone else¡s dangerous game.

John Shirley
Crawlers
(Del Rey; 1st Edition: New York 2003)
A top-secret military research program involving nanoparticles goes awry, entering a small Bay Area town and altering the human construction of its citizens.

Brian Stableford
Architects of Emortality
(Tor Books: New York 1999)
In an age where nanotechnology has brought near immortality to humans, two detectives of the U.N. police investigate the murder of scientists through genetically-altered flowers.

Brian Stableford
Inherit the Earth
(Tor Books: New York 1999)
In a future where biomedical nanotechnology has lengthened human lives to 150 years and robust health, the protagonist is forced into a cat and mouse game with immortality as the prize.

Neal Stephenson
Diamond Age: Or, a Young Lady's Illustrated Primer
(Bantam Books, Incorporated: New York 2000)
In a future ruled by Neo-Victorian thought, a nanotech engineer is commissioned to create an illegal primer which is in fact a powerful nanotech computer which teaches girls to think for themselves. He loses the book which is subsequently found by a homeless girl. What the girl learns from the book eventually changes the world.

John F. X. Sundman
Acts of the Apostles
(Rosalita Associates: Vineyard Haven, Massachusetts 1999)
A burnt-out software engineer discovers that the key to the Gulf War Syndrome is nanotechnologically produced submicroscopic machines that rearrange human DNA, which is being developed in a pharmaceutical laboratory in Switzerland. He works on stopping this laboratory from further development.

Movies

Bombshell
(1997), Vidmark/Trimark
A nanotech engineer who is forcibly implanted with a bomb developed through nanotechnology tries to save himself and catch the perpetrator.

Star Trek-First Contac
(1996), Paramount Studio
The Borg, whose goal is to destroy other races by injecting them with nanoprobes which turn them into drones, invades Federation space hoping to defeat it in battle or to prevent the invention of warp travel which would prevent first contact with alien species.

Virtuosity
(1995), Paramount Studio
A virtual reality serial killer computer program which is used for training police officers, enters the real world by injecting his personality into a nano-machine android.

Cartoons

Anthony S. Napier
NanoWars
NanoWars is a site that contains science fiction stories that are related to nanotechnology. Anthony Napier has a two-chapter cartoon entitled NanoWars that shows two computers that have been developed with Artificial Intelligence wage war against with nanotechnology playing a major role. The Cartoon is available at: http://www.geocities.com/asnapier/nano/nanowars

More Biotechnology in the Arts

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Genetic Discrimination in the Arts
Germline Intervention in the Arts
Human Cloning in the Arts