However, a team of researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have done just that – creating carbon nanotubes with the help of common household materials.

Led by Richard Li, a graduate student in MIT's Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics, the team created carbon nanotubes using household ingredients rich in sodium, such baking soda, table salt and detergent pellets. Additionally, the team did it without the use of high heat that is usually required for the process. In doing so, the team demonstrated a brand new way to create carbon nanotubes.

Carbon nanotubes from salt
Prior to this study, scientists would use iron as the catalyst for creating carbon nanotubes. Here, a material such a carbon fiber would be coated in an iron-based catalyst, and then heated to over 1,400 F in a chamber filled with carbon dioxide and other carbon-rich gasses. At this temperature, the iron atoms draw the carbon out of the gasses. These eventually form individual tubes of carbon. Scientists dissolve the remaining catalyst, leaving behind pure carbon nanotubes.

Li's team came about the new method of creating carbon nanotubes by accident. They were researching ways of growing carbon nanotubes on different surfaces with different compounds using iron when they found that the resulting nanotubes looked a bit different. Upon further inspection, they discovered that a small quantity of sodium was causing the growth. This represented the first time that carbon nanotubes had been observed to grow from a sodium-based catalyst.