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April 16, 2015
Why Civilization Would Likely Collapse without Silicon Wafers
by
AlRitch,
in
Gadgets & Technology
New
We all like to think of our modern civilization as a tapestry of varying cultures, religions, morals, characters, personalities. All different colors and thicknesses of threads make up the tapestry – every thread as important as every other in making the civilization and society work harmoniously.
But let’s face it, even the best-made tapestry can came apart if the one “right” thread is pulled. Sometimes it can be hard to see, but it also can be right under your nose. And when you think about it, that may well be the case with this tapestry we call civilization today.
Have you given much thought to microchips and silicon wafers? Is it possible that these harmless little technological marvels could very well lead to the Apocalypse if they went away?
We know that computers have become an invaluable tool in many of our lives. But let’s think a little bit more about computers. Sure, we recognize them as desktops, laptops, tablets and smartphones. And there are millions and millions of them around the world. And for many people, these computers are the lifeblood of our work and our lives. Some of us can’t write letters to family without a computer, or make that next great sales presentation, or communicate with that key client, without a computer device!
But what about other things in your life? With silicon chips, there are many more computers in our lives that we may be hard-pressed to recognize. Nowadays, unless your car is from the 1990s, it is a computer on wheels. Your cook your food in a microwave with a digital timer and buttons for various functions. You keep your food cold in a freezer or refrigerator that has its temperature regulated so it stays consistent no matter how many times the doors are opened. Your Blu-ray player, your television, your stereo system, are all digitized - there is no analog anywhere, so all of those devices run on some kind of computer chips.
Shoot, even your electricity is regulated by computer now, as is your water supply. How do you think the water utility knows how much water you use? Your meter feeds a computer that tracks everyone’s usage, and that is how the water bills are produced.
As you think on these things, you may likely come to the conclusion that computer chips are more ubiquitous than we might give credit. There is very little in our lives that is not based or driven by computers in some form or another. And that can easily lead one to think back to how these computer chips get built, and one inevitably goes back to the silicon wafer.
Let’s not think about what life would be like had the silicon wafer not been developed, but instead look at the world had we stopped developing them one day without something to replace them. What if, in other words, silicon wafers were the thread to be pulled on the tapestry that is today’s civilized society?
Could civilization survive without silicon wafers? Could our society prevail if there were no more computer chips to run our various devices? As computer chips were designed to replace such analog devices as vacuum tubes, cathode ray tubes and even radiators, and those quaint analog tools weren’t coming back in a post-silicon wafer era, can you imagine what could happen?
Would it be the Apocalypse?
Wouldn’t that be greatly underestimating the ingenuity of man? We have to be optimistic here. No, the demise of the silicon wafer would not bring our civilization to its knees, but certainly there would be a period of chaos while mankind works to innovate and develop a suitable replacement to the silicon wafer. With the omnipresence of computer chips in all aspects of our lives, it would certainly be reasonable to expect some turmoil, but it is also reasonable to expect that man is adaptable and innovative to come up with something that will prevent a complete collapse of civilization and keep us out of caves.
But what might that look like? What material would it made from? And how would our electronic devices behave differently with this new entity? Perhaps it is the uncertainty of this that is what makes for apocalyptic thoughts about the loss of silicon wafers, and not the loss of the items themselves.
It is just food for thought. While you hunker down in your shelter.
New
Radiographic Inspection and What It Tells Us!
Most people have a good idea – not just of what X-rays are and how they’re used – but of lots of other things we could be doing with them. These ideas range from the lascivious to the fantastic, in areas like espionage and counter-intelligence to just spying on your neighbors or peering into your boss’s strong box. Since powerful and sometimes dangerous X-ray equipment came into broad use some 100 years ago, it’s only sparked imaginations and incited us to look further – and deeper. And sometimes to look again.
X-ray technology is still almost uniquely associated with the healthcare industry. Indeed, some of the most important work that X-rays allow people to do will probably always be associated with seeing into human bodies, detecting anomalies and allowing doctors to diagnose, detect and determine what to do next.
But radiography, that is, the use of electromagnetic radiation, including and especially X-rays, to see through objects, is not just for looking into bodies at broken bones.
Radiography is also commonly used for things like:
- Crystallography to study the development and growth of crystals
- Astronomy where astronomers study X-rays being emitted by stars and other objects in outer space
- Fluorescence, which allows chemists to study the compositions of metals, ceramics, building materials and glass
- Computed tomography (CT) in which three-dimensional representations of components can be produced directly from X-ray images
Even in art history, paintings are analyzed to see how and why pigments degrade or breakdown, or even what revisions a painting may have gone through while the artist was working on it. Museums and art restoration laboratories will often subject paintings to radiography tests to see what it is they’re dealing with in a given painting.
Industrial Radiography
Among the most common uses for radiographic imaging are in making sure that the things around you are safe, safe to use, and that they’re put together well. The things you use every day, from cars and bridges to your refrigerator and other appliances in the home, all get subjected to X-rays long before they’re put to use. Sometimes, as with bridges, they’ll be X-rayed again and again, in order to make sure they’re still safe and still holding up suitably to carry traffic and heavy loads.
Essentially, just like would happen in the hospital with a radiologist, technicians equipped with radiographic equipment inspect and peer into all kinds of manufactured and industrial components in order to make sure they’re not suffering from some structural defect that could cause them to fail, break, decompose or fall apart with regular use. Just about everything around us has an expected “life-span” and X-ray technology allows us to better predict how long the useful life of these objects will be.
Electronics Inspection
As electronic components continue to appear in every possible area of our lives, the solders and semi-conductors inside of every component get increasingly frequent doses of X-rays. This allows manufacturers to see more of what is in there, and to avoid having to tear their components apart. This can include semi-conductor wafers, but all backplanes, and complete electronic interfaces. It’s often done right in the factory and sometimes right on the production line.
Food Production
The same goes for food production lines. Radiography is increasingly common in advanced and industrial areas of production where technicians can watch for foreign objects or contaminants.
Wheels and Tires
Tires are often made up of a combination of synthetic and natural rubbers, plus steel cords and other materials. Re-treading or re-using them can open a whole new range of risks in terms of defects and manufacturing worries. Radiography keeps that risk to a minimum and is often used on every tire leaving a production line.
Recycling
Speaking of re-using tires, recycling anything else is often made a lot easier with radiography where metals and other materials can be carefully or examined or simply sorted according to their makeup.
Types of Radiographic Inspection
Magna Chek uses a whole range of radiographic equipment to better see and see into the component we’re examining every day. The equipment allows us to do X-Rays and Real Time X-Rays (with a digital imaging system) and Real Time Radiography. We also do Gamma Ray inspections for deeper penetration into some materials including as much as 3.5 inches of solid steel. We can also do CT scans, that, as mentioned above, allow us to produce three-dimensional models. This is particularly important in some areas of flaw detection or failure analysis and where understanding the internal dynamics of a given material are particularly important.