While this technology still has a long way to go, challenges such as NASA's October 21 First Annual Space Elevator Competition at the Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley are spurring design teams to push the limits of both their robots and the super-strong, carbon nanotube-based ribbons that are key to supporting them.

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As silicon chips continue to shrink they will eventually reach their physical limits and Moore's law will hit a brick wall.

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"As we approach the ultimate limits of Moore's Law, however, silicon will have to be replaced in order to miniaturize further, " said Jeffrey Bokor, deputy director for science at the Molecular Foundry at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and Professor at UC-Berkeley.

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Rather, power consumption still haunts the company that ran up against the limits of power in 2004 with its top-end silicon at 4GHz.

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