When you need an address, definition, or information about anything on Earth, friends will tell you to “Google it.” However, what if your smart device or robot needs to look something up? As part of the Internet of Things, it may well have to. For them, “googling” may help narrow some choices, but the binary, yes-or-no answers that future devices will need in order to operate may come from another source altogether.

This source, called a “collaborative search engine,” is being driven and inspired by a half-century old institution, NASA.

What is a “collaborative search engine?” It is a search engine that by today’s standards is incomplete, not because a database is missing or links broken beyond repair, but because its primary source of information does not yet exist and is essentially pending discovery.

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