The production of microscopic fibres known as carbon nanotubes is opening up a whole new world of possibilities in the production of materials as diverse as ‘smart’ clothing through to television screens and solar energy panels.

Last year CSIRO Textile and Fibre Technology, working in conjunction with the NanoTech Institute of the University of Texas at Dallas in the US, created spun yarn for the first time from tiny fibres, which measure as little as a millionth of a millimetre in diameter.

Now, in a further step forward, the two organisations have unveiled a new process in which the carbon nanotubes, with properties that include high tensile strength and electrical and thermal conductivity, can also be made into wafer-thin, flexible, transparent sheets. Not only do these sheets retain the electrical conductive properties of the carbon nanotubes, they are stronger than steel sheets of the same weight.

Ken Atkinson, project leader in textile research and development at CSIRO, says producing sheets made from carbon nanotubes widens their potential applications to include products such as television screens, computer displays or solar energy collection panels. “There are a number of applications that it can be used with,” he says.

It has been envisaged that the yarn might be used in the development of military-style clothing, incorporating sensors that identify a soldier’s location and physical condition, and Mr Atkinson says the sheets can also be used in other textile applications. “You could lay the sheet onto a membrane and then bond the membrane to fabric, so underneath you’ve got the conductivity and the properties that you want and yet it’s protected from the environment,” he says. A patent is being sought and Mr Atkinson says commercial applications for the sheets are still being defined.

“We’ve got a revolutionary material with a range of different properties, but we’ve got to be right on the button in terms of producing what people want to pay for. We’re going through that exercise now.”

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Last Updated: November 11, 2005
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