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Waves Of The Future: Internet, Buckypaper

Buckypaper.jpg

Call me crazy, but I think this whole internet thing is really gonna take off one day. And, quite possibly, Buckypaper. It may just look like a turd wafer, but it's actually a paper-thin series of (carbon nano)tubes.

Buckypaper is 10 times lighter but potentially 500 times stronger than steel when sheets of it are stacked and pressed together to form a composite. Unlike conventional composite materials, though, it conducts electricity like copper or silicon and disperses heat like steel or brass.

Buckypaper is made from tube-shaped carbon molecules 50,000 times thinner than a human hair. Due to its unique properties, it is envisioned as a wondrous new material for light, energy-efficient aircraft and automobiles, more powerful computers, improved TV screens and many other products.

Well damn, I bet ol' Buckminster is on cloud nine right now. Literally -- he died in 1983. But seriously, what good is black paper if you don't have a white pencil?

Future planes, cars may be made of 'buckypaper'
[usatoday]

Thanks to The_Don, who invented Buckypaper, rock, scissors, and never loses.

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