A PROPOSED METABOLISM FOR A HYDROCARBON ASSEMBLER

Molecular manufacturing should let us synthesize most arrangements of atoms that are consistent with physical law. Assemblers have been prop osed as a means of accomplishing this objective. They would be able to build a wide range of useful products as well as copies of themselves . A simpler though less general proposal is a hydrocarbon assembler, r estricted to manufacturing relatively stiff hydrocarbons. The design a nd analysis of such an assembler should be substantially simpler than that of a more general assembler. In this paper, we consider the 'inte rmediary metabolism' of a hydrocarbon assembler, i.e. the set of react ions that permit processing of the feedstock molecules and their conve rsion into molecular tools (positionally controlled carbenes, radicals , and other reactive species). The specific feedstock molecule analyze d is butadiyne (a linear molecule, C4H2, also known as diacetylene; no t to be confused with the more common but chemically distinct nonlinea r molecule butadiene: C4H6).