Knitting with nanotubes

As if pulling threads from a silkworm’s cocoon, researchers in China have drawn fine yarns of carbon nanotubes from a reservoir of the microscopic carbon cylinders.

The resulting nanotube yarns, which can reach lengths of more than 30 centimeters, might eventually be woven into super-strong materials such as bullet-stopping fabrics, suggest Kaili Jiang, Qunqing Li, and Shoushan Fan of the Nanotechnology Research Center at Tsinghua University in Beijing.