I can’t find the post right now, but some time ago I know I had a link to an article about some scientists who had formed a sheet of material made from nanothreads made up of billions and billions of buckyballs. They ended up with a single sheet that was as strong as steel but ten times thinner than paper.
Today, this blog post at Discover magazine says that researchers think they will be able to produce a sheet of what they now call “buckypaper” that will rival the strongest composite materials in production and do it before the end of this year. They think they can have a commercially-usable version of buckypaper developed sometime in 2009 that would be suitable for military applications such as lighter armor or some aviation uses; dreams of building cars, airplanes or even space vehicles out of buckypaper are a bit farther down the road but could happen in less than a decade.
but can I use it to start the barbecue or fireplace?
Probably not, but you could BUILD a barbecue or fireplace with buckypaper!