RE: Metal transport (was: platoon stuff and combat engineers)

G'day,

> Sounds like metals won't work for Terran organisms, but there's no
> particular reason why they couldn't work for organisms using 
> a different chemistry. 

Yep... its actually an interesting thought experiment as to whether
biologies based on different chemistries can exist... are we refined to
the
chemistries we see today because their precursors were the only ones
that
turned up or because they're the only ones that can turn up ;)

> As far as physics and chemistry are 
> concerned, there don't seem to be any special obstacles, right?

As far as I know, but the chemists and physicists may have something to
say
about that. Having said that certain chemicals are more suited for
certain
tasks (e.g. Carbon due to its flexibility, electron shell config etc).

> Which means that your titanium-shelled bugs and 
> titanium-munching wasps are
> at least as possible as anti-grav tanks. Probably more so, 
> come to think of it...

And much less against my grain than biological things functioning in a
vacuum... not that I'm about to throw the SV baby out with the
biological
bath water ;)

> As far as brittleness, organisms are pretty good at creating 
> composites to improve various engineering properties. 
> I don't see this as a problem at all; it could easily 
> have lattices of something else in it, if it's built up
> through accretion in atomic (or molecular) units.

Yep, though I'm not sure where the matrix size would fall on that.
Though my
"battle suits" sort of use the same idea in that they're made form a
"living
composite alga". Basically they're a chemical structure derived from
algal
colonies that is kept "alive" inside thin self repairing suits (that
just
happen to look like everyday battledress from a distance). They're
flexible
enough to allow everyday movement without restrictions, but when hit
hard or
with high intensity (e.g. shrapnel, bullet, sharp edge or point) they
act
like a rigid body (think of the difference between when you enter water
quickly or slowly). This gives the wearer roughly the same protection as
D6
(or for really good suits D8) armour with the added bonus that the suits
have a cryptomatch ability (like octopus cam). Though diseases can dull
the
colour change ability and too many quick transitions can lead to colour
lag.

Cheers

Beth