Nano-gun...

RocketManJames · #1 03-11-2005, 02:38 PM

Another one of my stupid questions. Say we had a special gun that fired TINY bullets (~50-100 nm) at extremely high speeds. How dangerous would such a gun be? If you were to shoot someone in the stomach 5 times, would they even feel it? Would they get hurt by this? Would they die?

I really have no clue what the answer is, but this just popped into my head while I was driving. And, if such a gun could actually cause serious damage to someone... wouldn't it be nearly impossible for law enforcement to find evidence, proper cause of death/injury, etc?

-RMJ

jakethebake · #2 03-11-2005, 02:42 PM

I'm pretty sure it could kill someone, but i have no idea how big 50-100 nm is.

junkmail3 · #3 03-11-2005, 02:43 PM

[ QUOTE ]
I'm pretty sure it could kill someone, but i have no idea how big 50-100 nm is.

[/ QUOTE ]

Atoms are something like 10nm in diameter.

chaas4747 · #4 03-11-2005, 02:47 PM

Stop smoking [censored] P.O.T. while you are driving.

2planka · #5 03-11-2005, 02:47 PM

Depends....

What is the mass of the projectile? What is its velocity? What is the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow?

Lazymeatball · #6 03-11-2005, 02:48 PM

Well, this is just a guess, but I bet if you looked into what kind of force or momentum is neccesary for objects to pierce human flesh you would find that the speed neccesary for these bullets of a very small mass to be succesfull would be impractical/unatainable. That and I don't think the bullets themselves would do much damage, maybe if they were poisoned they would be more effective.

Chairman Wood · #7 03-11-2005, 02:48 PM

This happens all the time. Just regular thermal motion. Something similar on only about one order of magnitude more would be just burning someone with a laser.

YourFoxyGrandma · #8 03-11-2005, 02:49 PM

A bullet that small would have to be travelling really fuc[/b]king fast to actually puncture your skin because of its supposed small mass. Assuming that it could puncture your skin, I'm pretty sure that the wound created by a 50-100 nm bullet would be too small to actually do any damage; your body would heal itself before any major bleeding occured.

2planka · #9 03-11-2005, 02:52 PM

... unless the projectile was of sufficient mass to produce hydro-shock. Sort of like a pebble against the windshield.

jakethebake · #10 03-11-2005, 02:52 PM

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A bullet that small would have to be travelling really fuc[/b]king fast to actually puncture your skin because of its supposed small mass.

[/ QUOTE ]

Why? Won't something tiny puncture more easily?