Diamond, for all its great beauty, is not nearly as interesting as the hexagonal plane of graphite. It is not nearly as interesting because we live in a three-dimensional space, and in diamond, each atom is surrounded in all three directions in space by a full coordination.

Carbon has this genius of making a chemically stable, two-dimensional, one-atom-thick membrane in a three-dimensional world. And that, I believe, is going to be very important in the future of chemistry and technology in general.

Nature - how, we don't know - has technology that works in every living cell and that depends on every atom being precisely in the right spot. Enzymes are precise down to the last atom. They're molecules. You put the last atom in, and it's done. Nature does things with molecular perfection.

Essentially, every technology you have ever heard of, where electrons move from here to there, has the potential to be revolutionized by the availability of molecular wires made up of carbon. Organic chemists will start building devices. Molecular electronics could become reality.

Clean water is a great example of something that depends on energy. And if you solve the water problem, you solve the food problem.