MIT researcher Angela Belcher announced her team has created a new way of making nanomaterials using viruses as microscopic building blocks. Belcher is a professor of materials science and biological engineering at MIT.

The harmless viruses used by Belcher have been engineered into tiny building blocks, which she has used in high concentrations to develop a wispy white fiber several centimeters long. The fiber is as strong as nylon, but glows bright red when held up to ultraviolet light.

While these fibers in themselves may not have much of a use, Belcher and her team of researchers are engineering the viruses to bind to different types of inorganic materials that can be used in battery electrodes, transistors and solar cells.

This method could be used for novel new products by weaving together the virus strands into flexible, thread-like rechargeable batteries capable of being woven into fabric. This idea has caught the attention of U.S. Army researchers who envision uniforms that can be used to operate gear from solar power such as night vision goggles.

This virus based technology could be an alternative to the carbon nanotube solar panel technology grabbing headlines for use in solar panels recently.

Other military applications could include uniforms that can sense chemical agents. Belcher’s developments have paved the way for future work in this area, but uniforms of this type could take decades to develop according to Charlene Mello, a macromolecular scientist at the Natick Solider Research Development and Engineering Center in Natick, MA.

Belcher's research, which dates back to 1998, has been hailed as nothing short of revolutionary in Science, Scientific American and TIME.