Carbon Nanotube Space Elevator
The idea of a ‘space elevator’ has been around since the late 1800s. Until now, there wasn’t a material strong enough to build it. Then carbon nanotubes stepped in.
It’s official: everyone in the future will be made entirely out of carbon nanotubes. They may be able to cure cancer, they may be able to rewire our brains, they may be able to make synthetic skin. Basically, they may be able to replace an entire person. But once we’ve made all of these Carbon Nanotubians, what will they do all day? The answer has come at last: they’ll take an elevator into space. One that’s also made of carbon nanotubes. That elevator has been a gleam in an engineer’s eye for over a hundred years, and now, thanks to carbon nanotubes, it has become, at the very least, a structural possibility.
