Electromechanical actuators based on sheets of single-walled carbon nanotubes were shown to generate higher stresses than natural muscle and higher strains than high-modulus ferroelectrics. Like natural muscles, the macroscopic actuators are assemblies of billions of individual nanoscale actuators. The actuation mechanism (quantum chemical–based expansion due to electrochemical double-layer charging) does not require ion intercalation, which limits the life and rate of faradaic conducting polymer actuators. Unlike conventional ferroelectric actuators, low operating voltages of a few volts generate large actuator strains. Predictions based on measurements suggest that actuators using optimized nanotube sheets may eventually provide substantially higher work densities per cycle than any previously known technology.

Structure, thermodynamics, and electronic properties are predicted for a new low energy phase of carbon which contains planar sheets equally occupied by sp² and sp carbon atoms. The isolated planar sheets have the same planar symmetry as do the layers in graphite (p6m) and can be formally viewed as resulting from the replacement of one‐third of the carbon–carbon bonds in graphite by –C 3/4 C– linkages. This material, called graphyne, is predicted to have a crystalline state formation energy of 12.4 kcal/mol carbon, which appears to be much lower than for any carbon phase which contains acetylenic groups as a major structural component. Based on the major structural reorganization required for graphitization and the observed high temperature stability of known model compounds, high temperature stability is predicted for graphyne. While graphyne will have similar mechanical properties as graphite, it is predicted to be a large bandgap semiconductor (Eg=1.2 eV) rather than a metal or semimetal. Based on this bandgap and the known behavior of related conjugated polymers having linear structures, interesting nonlinear optical properties (including a large third‐order susceptibility) are expected. Property aspects are also predicted for other previously uninvestigated carbon phases which are structurally related to graphyne. Finally, structural features of alkali metal charge–transfer complexes of graphyne, which are expected to be metallic, and of related carbon phases are predicted.