Michael Crichton wrote a book about this kind of thing. Nanotechnological robots. That are a bunch of different pieces but move as one, change or make shapes, etc. Cool technology, book was ok.
I read the book when it first came out, Prey. I am a bit freaked how everything scifi that I read tends to shift over into reality which makes life a bit more questionable. They were suppose to make a movie based on the book. Don't know what happened. It seems that anything can be created from any novel idea that is presented to the masses. Some think tank or individual will figure it out.
This is the first pornsite I've found in years that I'd actually advertise to swarmers. When you first load it up, it looks just like every crappy scam site out there, except that it's real. It's huge, it's updated constantly, there's no spam, no popups, and no bullshit -- and it's completely free. When you sign up through that link above and respond to the confirmation email, I make a bit of loose change.
See what other swarmers have to say about it. People love this place, so I feel fine about sending you there and am confident you will enjoy boners.