Difference between revisions of "Assembly layer"

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(natural choice)
(Layers as natural choice)
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'''All layers in an arbitrarily deep stack (with equivalent step sizes) have equal throughput.'''
 
'''All layers in an arbitrarily deep stack (with equivalent step sizes) have equal throughput.'''
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== Consequence of lack of layers ==
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Since every layer has the same productivity (mass per time) the very thin bottommost layer has the same productivity as the (practically or hypothetically implementet) uppermost convergent assembly layer - a single cube with the size of the sidelength of the factory. Slowing down slightly to from m/s to cm/s or mm/s speeds prevent excessive waste heat.
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== Maximizing productivity ==
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For all but the most extreme applications a stratified design will work well.
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Going beyond that it becomes tedious. As an analogy one can compare it to going from very useful PCs to more specialised grapic cards.
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Filling the whole Factory volume with the immense productivity density of the bottommost layer(s) of a stratified design would lead to unhandlable requirements for product expulsion (too high accelerations) and ridiculousdly high waste heat that could even with advanced [[heat transport]] only be handled for very short peaks.
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Sensible working designs for continuous maximum performance cannot fill a whole cube volume with an implementation of the bottommost [[assembly levels]] but need a complicated an unflexible 3D fractal design. If one goes to the limits the cooling facilities will become way bigger than the factory.
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Deviating from the stack structure to get more volume than the bottommost layer in a stratified design where actual mechanosynthesis happens
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* makes system design onsiderably harder (less scale invariance, harder post design system adjustability)
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* may lead to a bottlenech at the upper convergent assembly levels.
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=== Assemblers ===
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The early (and probably outdated) "universal molecular assembler" concept also fills space but has a lot lower density of locations where mechanosynthesis takes place so there might not be a bottleneck problem.
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The actual problems are:
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* the integration of basic [[assembly levels]] (not layers) and if "simplified" the severly complicated product design by the lack of intermediate standard part handling.
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* the obstructive scaffold that needs mobility logic at or above the one of [[microcomponent maintainance units]]
  
 
== Slowdown through stepsize ==
 
== Slowdown through stepsize ==

Revision as of 19:59, 20 May 2014

This article is a stub. It needs to be expanded.

The layers in a nanofactory are the assembly levels mapped to the assembly layers interspersed by routing layers.

Layers as natural choice

Scaling laws say that when halfing the size of a any generalized assembly unit one can put four such units below. Those are twice as fast and produce each an eight of the amout of product the upper unit produces. Multiplied together one sees that the top layer and the layer with units of halve size below have exactly the same throughput. This works not just with halving the size but with any subdivision.

All layers in an arbitrarily deep stack (with equivalent step sizes) have equal throughput.

Consequence of lack of layers

Since every layer has the same productivity (mass per time) the very thin bottommost layer has the same productivity as the (practically or hypothetically implementet) uppermost convergent assembly layer - a single cube with the size of the sidelength of the factory. Slowing down slightly to from m/s to cm/s or mm/s speeds prevent excessive waste heat.

Maximizing productivity

For all but the most extreme applications a stratified design will work well. Going beyond that it becomes tedious. As an analogy one can compare it to going from very useful PCs to more specialised grapic cards.

Filling the whole Factory volume with the immense productivity density of the bottommost layer(s) of a stratified design would lead to unhandlable requirements for product expulsion (too high accelerations) and ridiculousdly high waste heat that could even with advanced heat transport only be handled for very short peaks. Sensible working designs for continuous maximum performance cannot fill a whole cube volume with an implementation of the bottommost assembly levels but need a complicated an unflexible 3D fractal design. If one goes to the limits the cooling facilities will become way bigger than the factory.

Deviating from the stack structure to get more volume than the bottommost layer in a stratified design where actual mechanosynthesis happens

  • makes system design onsiderably harder (less scale invariance, harder post design system adjustability)
  • may lead to a bottlenech at the upper convergent assembly levels.

Assemblers

The early (and probably outdated) "universal molecular assembler" concept also fills space but has a lot lower density of locations where mechanosynthesis takes place so there might not be a bottleneck problem. The actual problems are:

  • the integration of basic assembly levels (not layers) and if "simplified" the severly complicated product design by the lack of intermediate standard part handling.
  • the obstructive scaffold that needs mobility logic at or above the one of microcomponent maintainance units

Slowdown through stepsize

Increasing the size of a step between layers slows down the throughput due to a shrinking manipulator per surface area number. In the extreme case one has one scanning probe microscope for a whole [[1]] op particles where it would take times way beyond the age of the universe to assemble anything human hand sized. This by the way is the reason why massive parallelity is a necessity and exponential assembly or self replication is necessary.

Increased stepsices bring the benefit of less design restrictions in the products. The lowdown incurred by them can in bounds be compensated with parallelity in parts assembly. To avoid a bottleneck all stepsizes in the stack should be similar.