"It's ironic we had to look so far back in the literature to understand something that may so radically change our future." No, it's expected. Fundamental scie

"It's ironic we had to look so far back in the literature to understand something that may so radically change our future." No, it's expected. Fundamental science rarely "ages", it just might be a while before it can find applications. I hope for a future where scientific discoveries don't fade, they are just input into some distributed semantic database as a "fact". Combined with researchers who are taught to use these tools and to think in a multi-disciplinary fashion, this could really accelerate the pace of discovery and invention.