From nanoscale to macroscale: applications of nanotechnology to production of bulk ultra-strong materials

Abstract

Carbon nanotubes have been famous since their discovery twenty years ago for their remarkable physical properties, from strength a hundred times higher than steel, to electrical current capacity a 1,000 times higher than copper. But so far they have only been produced at most up to centimeter lengths. Here are presented some proposals to combine the nanotubes in such a way to get arbitrarily long lengths while maintaining their extraordinary physical properties.