US scientists have developed a breakthrough technique for creating functional electronic circuits using microscopic nanotubes.

The physicists at the University of Pennsylvania unveiled a revolutionary process which centers on dipping semiconductor chips into liquid suspensions of carbon nanotubes. Single-walled nanotubes are formed by turning a single sheet of carbon atoms into a seamless cylinder approximately one nanometer a billionth of a meter in diameter.     

Instead of growing nanotubes in a pattern on a silicon chip, as is conventionally done, the Penn researchers devised a means of "sprinkling" nanotubes onto chips. Ultimately they can make it in a way that the nanotubes only stick where they want them to in order to form a circuit.

The resulting circuits take advantage of unique electrical properties of nanotubes and can be produced in bulk.  Since the process allows the creation of nanotubes via processes separate from the chips, it allows for a better control of the quality and diameter.