Stefan Mileschin

A team of researchers at Penn State University said it has produced ultrathin diamond nanothreads that could just possibly lead to the production of a space elevator between earth and the moon.

John V Badding, a professor of chemistry at Penn, said: “One of our wildest dreams for the nanomaterials we are developing is that they could be used to make the super-strong, lightweight cables that would make possible the construction of a “space elevator”, which so far has existed only as a science-fiction idea.”

The discovery shows that the nanothreads include a long strand of carbon atomswhich resemble the fundamental unit of a diamond.

http://channeleye.co.uk/diamond-nano...t-us-to-space/