Scientists might have accidentally solved the hardest part in building space elevators.

The "accident" led scientists to develop Diamond nanothreads. The material itself is only a few atoms across and more than 20,000 times thinner than a human hair.

Don't let its size fool you, however. While it is thin and small, it's also stronger and stiffer than any other carbon nanotube or polymer to date.

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This makes it an ideal material for space elevators.

The idea to make the elevator was put forth some months ago, but it was technically difficult to find a material that could serve as a tether.

With a little bit of luck, however, John Badding and his team from Penn State University discovered the best candidate for the tether.

Their mistake came when they subjected liquid benzene to extreme pressures equal to 200,000 times the pressure at the surface of the earth.

Afterwards, they slowly decreased the pressure. What formed were extremely thin, tight rings of carbon that looked structurally identical to diamonds.

A space elevator is a revolutionary machine that looks to change the face of space travel, both in a procedural and economic sense.

The team used a high-pressure device called a Paris-Edinburgh device to compress a 6 millimeter wide thread of liquid benzene.

The volume of the liquid benzene and the size of the Paris-Edinburgh device forced them to relieve the pressure more slowly than they would have otherwise. Out came the great accident that is Diamond nanothreads.

A Japanese firm has vowed to have a space elevator up and running by 2050.

While most of the companies have begun developing technology and vehicles for space travel (with most using spaceships and rockets) this idea uses an elevator that simply moves up all the way to space.

Back when they announced their idea, the only thing standing in their way was finding a method to build nanotubes three centimeters wide that could be used for their purposes.

They said they'd be able to build all the materials they need by 2030, but it seems Badding and his team quickened their pace by 16 years.

TagsDiamond nanothreads, space elevator, Paris-Edinburgh