I love this micro-structure sort of stuff. Another good one is nacre (aka "mother of pearl")[1], which is composed of microscopic hexagonal platelets, made from

I love this micro-structure sort of stuff. Another good one is nacre (aka "mother of pearl")[1], which is composed of microscopic hexagonal platelets, made from aragonite. Nanotechnology is pretty old and common tech, it seems; we just don't have a good handle on it ourselves, yet. On a different note, one interesting theory is the "Clay origin of life"[2], where life began with non-organic crystal replication, and bootstrapped from there. Reminds me of the phrase "humans are the reproductive organs of machines". Maybe the crystals are the ones really driving the show, and we were just developed to help out (: [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nacre#Structure_and_appearance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nacre#Structure_and_appearance [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abiogenesis#Clay https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abiogenesis#Clay