Low-energy electronic properties of pairs of identical carbon nanotubes

The tight-binding model is employed to study the low-energy electronic properties of aligned pairs of identical single-wall carbon nanotubes with the intertube interactions. The rotational symmetry about the tube axes is totally broken, and the intertube interactions hybridize the atomic states on e...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Philosophical magazine (Abingdon, England) England), 2009-09, Vol.89 (27), p.2369-2380
Main Authors: Lien, Jiun-Yi, Lin, Min-Fa
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
band calculations
bundle
carbon nanotubes
Condensed matter: electronic structure, electrical, magnetic, and optical properties
Condensed matter: structure, mechanical and thermal properties
Cross-disciplinary physics: materials science
rheology
electronic density of states
electronic properties
Electronic structure and electrical properties of surfaces, interfaces, thin films and low-dimensional structures
Electronic structure of nanoscale materials : clusters, nanoparticles, nanotubes, and nanocrystals
Exact sciences and technology
intertube interactions
low-dimensional nanomaterials
Low-dimensional structures (superlattices, quantum well structures, multilayers): structure, and nonelectronic properties
Materials science
metal insulator transitions
Nanoscale materials and structures: fabrication and characterization
Nanotubes
Physics
stacking types
Surfaces and interfaces
thin films and whiskers (structure and nonelectronic properties)
tight-binding
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Summary:The tight-binding model is employed to study the low-energy electronic properties of aligned pairs of identical single-wall carbon nanotubes with the intertube interactions. The rotational symmetry about the tube axes is totally broken, and the intertube interactions hybridize the atomic states on each tube to create new sub-bands. Sub-band spacing, sub-band curvature, band-edge states, and energy gaps are sensitive to stacking types and are also dependent on the radius and the chirality of the tubes. The systems could be metal, semimetal, or semiconductor depending on their stacking types. In particular, an armchair pair keeps the band structures linear like a single tube if the pair has a glide symmetry with respect to the plane between its constituent tubes. Breaking this symmetry makes the pair semimetallic or semiconducting. However, there are no such properties for chiral and zigzag pairs. The variations in electronic structures of these pairs are more complicated and more sensitive to the tube radii. Instead of being like a rope or a large bundle, the stacking-type dependent behavior is more similar to commensurate double-wall carbon nanotubes.
ISSN:1478-6435
1478-6443
DOI:10.1080/14786430903117158