Silicon's successor lurks in the lab

Other researchers also say that silicon nanowires -- solid microscopic strands of silicon -- could prove to be easier for semiconductor makers to graft onto existing manufacturing processes.

"Silicon nanowires might be less perfect, but they may be easier to integrate into chips," said KJ Cho, a professor of mechanical engineering at Stanford University.

Reducing the dimensions
A carbon nanotube is essentially a sheet of carbon atoms -- arranged in hexagons -- that curls up into a tube. It comes in two basic varieties: a single-walled nanotube, which is a single coil of carbon hexagons; and a multiwalled version, wherein a single tube is encased in a wider tube, which itself is inside other tubes. Most of today's research is concentrated on single-walled tubes.

The tubes' properties are significant because of two factors: their size, which allows them to function as one-dimensional objects, and the intrinsic nature of carbon.

From a purely Euclidean perspective, physical objects on this planet, including nanotubes, all exist in three-dimensional space, which can be measured through X (horizontal), Y (vertical) and Z (depth) coordinates.

Scientists, however, assert that dimensions can become irrelevant. A film negative, for instance, functions more like a two-dimensional object. Negatives technically have height, measured by the Z coordinate, but it can't readily be used.

Because one-dimensional nanotubes have no height or width, they are the atomic equivalent of a bowling-ball return. As a result, electrons can travel ballistically on them -- that is, barring obstacles or flaws in the material, electrons don't get scattered or lost.

"If you have a ballistic conductor, your charge can go completely unimpeded," said Joerg Appenzeller, a carbon nanotube researcher at IBM Research. "The electronic properties are outstanding."