Submitted on January 22, 2008
Accepted on March 31, 2008
Subnanometer Motion of Cargoes Driven by Thermal Gradients along Carbon Nanotubes
Amelia Barreiro 1, Riccardo Rurali 2, Eduardo R. Hernández 3*, Joel Moser 1, Thomas Pichler 4, Laszlo Forro 5, Adrian Bachtold 1*
1 CIN2 Barcelona and CNM-CSIC, Campus UAB, E-08193 Bellaterra, Spain.
2 Departament d’Enginyeria Electrònica, UAB, 08193 Bellaterra, Spain.
3 Institut de Ciència de Materials de Barcelona, Campus UAB, E-08193 Bellaterra, Spain.
4 Faculty of Physics, University of Vienna, Strudlhofgasse 4, 01090 Wien, Austria.
5 EPFL, CH-1015 Lausanne, Switzerland.
* To whom correspondence should be addressed.
Eduardo R. Hernández , E-mail: ehe{at}icmab.es
Adrian Bachtold , E-mail: adrian.bachtold{at}cnm.es
An important issue in nanoelectromechanical systems is developing small electrically driven motors. We report on an artificial nanofabricated motor in which one short carbon nanotube moves relative to another coaxial nanotube. A cargo is attached to an ablated outer wall of a multiwall carbon nanotube that can rotate and/or translate along the inner nanotube. The motion is actuated by imposing a thermal gradient along the nanotube, which allows for sub-nanometer displacements, as opposed to an electromigration or random walk effect.
