Crudely speaking, electrons can move through the cloud from one end of the chain to the other. Conducting polymers are now finding uses in electronic devices and circuitry, replacing the traditional crystalline semiconductors such as silicon. Conducting 'plastics' are potentially cheaper, lighter and more resilient. But if individual polymer molecules are to be used as wires they might need to be electrically insulated from one another to prevent crosstalk. Another obstacle to using conducting polymers in electronics is that they are not very stable when exposed to air.
Oxygen attacks the conjugated chains and degrades the electrical conductivity.
If the polymer threads were encased in a protective coating, this might give them a longer shelf-life. It might also help the chains remain separate rather than clumping together, making it easier to deposit thin films of the plastics into device structures. Anderson and colleagues make their tubular casing from a series of short cylinders threaded onto the organic chains. Since the late 1980s, chemists have become very adept at making threaded molecules, in which a chain passes through a hoop or cylinder. When the ends of the thread are then 'knotted' by attaching bulky groups to prevent unthreading, these assemblies are called rotaxanes.