Seeds promise mass-produced nanotubes

Rice University chemists have revealed the first method for cutting carbon nanotubes into "seeds" and using those seeds to sprout new nanotubes. The findings offer hope that seeded growth may one day produce the large quantities of pure nanotubes needed for dozens of materials applications.

The research is available online and slated to appear in an upcoming issue of the Journal of the American Chemical Society.

Like vintners who hope to grow new vineyards from a handful of grape vine cuttings, Rice's chemists hope their new method of seeded growth for carbon nanotubes will allow them to reproduce their very best samples en masse.

‘Carbon nanotubes come in lots of diameters and types, and our goal is to take a pure sample of just one type and duplicate it in large quantities,’ said corresponding author James Tour, director of Rice's Carbon Nanotechnology Laboratory (CNL). ‘We've shown that the concept can work.’