Ring Closure of Carbon Nanotubes
Masahito Sano,*
Ayumi Kamino,
Junko Okamura,
Seiji Shinkai
Lightly etched single-walled carbon nanotubes are
chemically reacted to form rings. The rings appear to be fully closed
as opposed to open coils, as ring-opening reactions did not change the
structure of the observed rings. The average diameter of the rings was
540 nanometers with a narrow size distribution. The nanotubes in
solution were modeled as wormlike polymer chains, yielding a
persistence length of 800 nanometers. Nanotubes shorter than this
length behave stiffly and stay nearly straight in solution. However,
nanotubes longer than the Kuhn segment length of 1600 nanometers
undergo considerable thermal fluctuation, suggesting a greater
flexibility of these materials than is generally assumed.
Chemotransfiguration Project-JST, Kurume, Fukuoka 839-0861, Japan.
*
To whom correspondence should be addressed.