Although advances have been made in the synthesis of raw carbon nanotube (CNT) materials, the lack of efficient processes for assembly and integration of CNTs into functional forms has hindered the development of CNT-based devices. Here we report a dielectrophorestic method to manipulate, align and assemble CNTs into onedimensional nanostructures using an alternating-current electric field. Pre-formed CNTs dispersed in water are assembled into micro-electrodes and sub-micron diameter fibrils with variable lengths from 1 µm to over 1 cm. The CNTs within the fibril are bonded by van der Waals forces and are aligned along the fibril axis. This method affords fine control of the fibril length and is capable of parallel fabrication of multiple fibrils using the same material source. The short CNT fibrils can potentially be used as probes for scanning probe microscopes and the long ones as electrodes or conducting nanowires.

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