At the Toronto Hearings in 2011, Professor Niels Harrit described a new discovery related to the World Trade Center (WTC) dust. That new discovery was the presence of carbon nanotubes in the residues of nanothermite ignition. The importance of these results relates to the health of 9/11 first responders, whose fatal illnesses have remained largely a mystery to the medical profession.

Professor Harrit’s presentation in Toronto is available online in its entirety. Here is the shorter segment related to the finding of carbon nanotubes (CNTs).

As Harrit describes, the ignition residues he used were from experiments that I performed in my garage. Nanothermite was prepared using a formulation documented by researchers at a national laboratory and ignition was achieved simply by heating the nanothermite on a hot plate to the appropriate temperature. Here are video highlights of the process.

Harrit’s CNT results were duplicated by an independent commercial laboratory. The independent laboratory identified CNTs in the nanothermite ignition residues using Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM) and Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy (EDS) and comparison to reference CNT data. See the image below for an excerpt of the report on the sample submitted.

In 2010, researchers at Mount Sinai School of Medicine reported the presence of high levels of carbon nanotubes in the lungs of WTC first responders as well as in WTC dust samples. They wrote, “The finding of CNT in both WTC dust and lung tissues is unexpected and requires further study.”

CNT formation requires three basic components: a very high temperature, a source of carbon, and the presence of certain metals. In particular, formation of the single walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) found in the lungs of first responders requires the metals to be present. All of these requirements are met in the ignition of nanothermite. As Harrit stated in his presentation, it is the ideal environment for production of these CNTs.

Unfortunately, until medical professionals are willing to look at the evidence for the presence of thermitic materials at the WTC, which is extensive and compelling, the cause of 9/11 first responder illnesses will remain a tragic mystery.