Word: long
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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July 1, 2030. Like just about everyone she knows, Angela Jefferson, 36, wakes up to the insistent patter of a HealthWatch Model 9000 alarm clock. "Today is Monday, and the time is 6 a.m.," the little box chirps. Angela stares at its smooth, blue face long enough for the embedded microlaser to scan the back of her eye. "Ocular pressure, blood pressure and carbon-dioxide levels normal," the alarm clock reports. "But you are dehydrated. I'll signal the refrigerator to fix you an electrolyte cocktail...
...21st century. Nor will everyone be able to afford the latest treatments for cancer or Alzheimer's disease. For millions of people alive today, though, the ability to monitor their health more closely and start treatments at the earliest stages of disease means that many may live long enough to enjoy the blessings of the 22nd century...
...already redefining the meaning of the word miniature. The prefix nano- refers to a billionth part of a unit--the size range these visionaries are talking about. Already, nanotechnologists have built gears and rotors far thinner than a human hair and tiny molecular "motors" only 50 atoms long...
...that's just the beginning. Within a few decades, nanotechnologists predict, they will be creating machines that can do just about anything, as long as it's small. Germ-size robots will not just measure internal vital signs; they will also organize the data with molecular microcomputers and broadcast the results to a mainframe (implanted under your skin, perhaps), where the data can be analyzed for signs of disease. Nanomachines could then be sent to scour the arteries clean of dangerous plaque buildup, or aid the immune system in mopping up stray cancer cells, or even, a la Fantastic Voyage...
...assumption behind many of these futuristic scenarios is an idea that most researchers have begun to embrace but that many patients will undoubtedly find difficult to accept. That is the prediction that certain cancers may require treatment for the rest of a patient's long life. Coming out of a century that declared war on the disease, a century that felt the only reasonable response to a tumor was to annihilate it, this may be hard to imagine. But turning cancer into a controllable condition is not so different from treating high blood pressure or diabetes. "I don't think...