A Singularity

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Long time readers will know I have a fascination with carbon nanotubes. They seems to hold the answer to so many problems. The above talk gives some of the best examples of what carbon nanotubes can give us and explains it better than most of the scientific articles I’ve posted.

Fluorescent Nanotubes Enhance Mouse Imaging [Kurzweil AI]

So in the past we’ve learned that Carbon Nanotubes can be used to deliver drugs into the body quickly, or possibly even a targeted fashion. Now we can paint them fluorescent and inject them into the body and be able to track and image their progress with greater depth an accuracy than standard biocompatible dyes.

This means we can both deliver drugs and watch them get delivered in real-time. An amazing step in medicine.

Nanotube patch helps heal the heart [Kurzweil AI]

Forget stem cells, researchers at Brown University have figured out how to use carbon nanotubes to mimic natural tissue that can be used to replace certain nerve cells in the heart’s wall that help sense how the heart is beating in order to keep it regulated.

I always knew people had a place in their heart for carbon nanotubes!

New desalination process uses carbon nanotubes [Kurzweil AI]

So part of the problem with water is that the majority of it on Earth is full of salt and drinking that much salt just isn’t that good for us. So we came up with the word desalination to describing removing salt from water. Too bad most desalination processes are very energy intensive. However researchers at the New Jersey Institute of Technology have some up better process using carbon nanotubes that requires less heat and produces more drinkable water!

Low power memory from nanotubes by Katherine Bourzac [Technology review] via [Kurzweil]

So one of the biggest problems with our emerging mobile technology is finding energy efficient nonvolatile memory. That is memory that continues to hold information even after the power is turned off. The problem is that writing to standard flash memory takes up a proportionally large amount of energy but flash memory is also some of our smallest memory to date. Carbon Nanotubes, when combined with a new type of memory called phase-change memory, may be the key to overcoming this obstacle.

Scientists grow micro-machines from carbon [Kurzeweil AI]

I know! It has been forever since I posted a story about Carbon Nanotubes. I hope you’ll forgive me.

This particular article is more about the manufacturing of Carbon Nanotubes than one of the amazing technologies it will give us. In this particular case scientists have figured out a way to grow Carbon Nanotubes in certain patterns, such as the form of the Brigham Young University logo. Hopefully they can grow them in different, more useful shapes!

Stay tuned for new Carbon Nanotube news!

Did you know that certain configurations of carbon nanotubes are scared of water? I didn’t. In reality they just repell water really well. To the point that water droplets will break up into tinier droplets, rather than get absorbed or pass through the carbon nanotubes. What’s this mean? Highly waterproof clothing! And umbrellas, and the like. Perhaps. The applications haven’t been fully experimented on.

Interested in the specifics?

Finally! Some new news about Carbon Nanotubes!

New research by MIT scientists suggests that carbon nanotubes — tube-shaped molecules of pure carbon — could be formed into tiny springs capable of storing as much energy, pound for pound, as state-of-the-art lithium-ion batteries, and potentially more durably and reliably.

Carbon nanotubes find yet another purpose, could star in ultra-reliable batteries by Darren Murph (Engadget)

Found by two cuties from MTI (if the picture is correct). (I knew I should have gone to MIT!)

For those of you who want more of the hard science:

Springs built from nanotubes could provide big power storage potential (PHYSORG)

Pushing ions through carbon nanotubes by Editor (kurzweilai)

Not exactly and end result technology of carbon nanotubes but basically we can force ions to go through a carbon nanotube one at a time. This is predicted to lead to even better water filtration systems and detection systems than previously thought of using carbon nanotubes.

Hurray for Carbon Nanotubes!

Carbon nanotubes form ultrasensitive biosensor to detect proteins by Ed Hayward (EurekAlert!)

I’ve reported so much news about the wonder of Carbon Nanotubes I’m starting to wonder if I’m repeating myself. But this just announced: Carbon Nanotubes can be used to make an ultra sensitive bio-sensor that could detect proteins quicker than almost any laboratory test currently developed.