NanoComputer

At the right temperature, with the right catalyst, there's no reason a perfect single-walled carbon nanotube 50,000 times thinner than a human hair can't be grown a meter long.

Defects in nanotubes heal very quickly in a very small zone at or near the iron catalyst before they ever get into the tube wall, according to calculations by theoretical physicists at Rice University, Hong Kong Polytechnic University and Tsinghua University. Courtesy of Feng Ding/Rice/Hong Kong Polytechnic.

The  study of  the self-healing mechanism that could make such extraordinary growth possible, is important to scientists who see high-quality carbon nanotubes as critical to advanced materials and, if they can be woven into long cables, power distribution over the grid of the future.

Source: http://news.rice.edu/2012/06/15/nanotubes-seek-perfection-from-the-start/