CARBON NANOTUBES

INTRODUCTION
Think about a material about 50000 times smaller than width of a human hair, a material about 50 times more tensile than steel, a material 15 times more thermally conducting than copper, a material 1000 times more electrically conducting than silver, a material that can be used to create nanoscale motors and rheostats. Well if there is one material with all these versatilities, then that is one called CARBON NANOTUBES An allotrope of carbon, and belonging to fellerene structural family, CNTs were first discovered by IIJIMA in 1991. They can be picturised as hollow cylindrical tubes formed by rolling up Graphene sheets. They can be either singlewalled or multiwalled.

PROPERTIES THAT MAKE THEM SPECIAL 1.Chemical : As compared to grapheme sheets, they are much more
reactive due to increased pi orbital mismatch owing to increased curvature of their cylindrical structure. So they can show chemical reactivity where other materials remain dormant.

2.Electrical: Due to symmetry and unique electronic structure of

graphene ,their electrical properties are strongly affected by their structure,depending on which they are either semiconducting or metallic. Infact, metallic CNTs can show about 1000 times more conductivity than copper and silver.

3.Thermal: They are conductors longitudinally and insulators laterally.

Capable of transmitting as much as 6000 watts per metre per Kelvin at room temperature, they also show thermal stability upto 2800 degrees centigrade in vacuum and 750 degrees in air.

4.Mechanical: Having tensile strength of about 63 GPa, they have great

strength along their axis due to sp2 bonds between their carbon atoms. They, due to low density of 1.3-1.4 g/cu.m , have high specific strength. But CNTs buckle under high compressive ,torsional or bending stress, which can be seen as one of its weaknesses.

5.Kinetic: Multiwalled CNTs, multiple concentric nanotubes precisely

nested within one another, exhibit a striking telescoping property whereby an inner nanotube core may slide, almost without friction, within its outer nanotube shell thus creating an atomically perfect linear or rotational bearing. This can be used for precise positioning of molecules to form nanomachines like nanomotors and nanorheostats.

6.Optical nanotubes: Optically active nanotubes can be used in

nanooptical devices. But as the as the nanotubes grow in size, this property disappears, so it can only be used with very small nanaotubes.

DEFECTS
Like no gas is ideal ,no nanotube is free from flaws.They cantain defects. Firstly they have deformations, like bends and nanotube tube junctions, introduced by relacing hexagon with heptagon. It is called STONE WALES DEFECT.

Another kind of defect is caused by impurities like catalyst particles, that are built in during the growth of nanotubes.

... Left: a Y branch, defects are shown in blue right:a transition from metallic to semiconducting SWNT by insertion of pentagons and heptagons. Introduction of defects can result in various structures like Y branches, T branches etc. which can have even more interesting properties than their original forms.

SYNTHESIS
There are three popular methods of synthesizing carbon nanotubes:

Arc Discharge method: This method creates nanotubes

through arc-vaporisation of two carbon rods placed end to end, separated by approximately 1mm, in an enclosure that is usually filled with inert gas (helium, argon) at low pressure (between 50 and 700 mbar) or in liquid nitrogen. A direct current of 50 to 100 A driven by approximately 20 V creates a high temperature discharge between the two electrodes. The discharge vaporises one of the carbon rods and forms a small rod shaped deposit on the other rod. Producing nanotubes in high yield depends on the uniformity of the plasma arc and the temperature of the deposit form on the

carbon electrode15. However, it produces a mixture of components and requires separating nanotubes from the soot and the catalytic metals present in the crude product.

Laser Ablation Method:

In this method, a pulsed or continous laser is used to vaporise the graphite target in an oven at 1200 degree Celsius. Which is filled with He or Ar gas at 500 Torr. A very hot vopour plume forms, expands and cools rapidly and in this process small carbon molecules condense and form clusters including fullerenes. The catalysts present their caging. From these structures tubular molecules grow into SWNT until catalyst particles have become too large or system has cooled so sufficiently that no carbon can diffuse through the surface of catalyst particles. It results in a higher yield for SWNT synthesis and the nanotubes have better properties and a narrower size distribution than SWNTs produced by arc-discharge. Nanotubes produced by laser ablation are purer (up to about 90 % purity) than those produce by arc discharge method.

Chemical Deposition Method:

In this, first catalyst is prepared by sputtering a a transition metal like Fe,Co,or Ni on a substrate by chemical etching or thermal annealing ,inducing catalyst particle nucleation. Then a carbon containing gas like methane ,acetylene ,CO2 etc are cracked into molecular carbon by an energy source like plasma or resistively heated coil. The carbon diffuses towards substrate where it binds and grows into nanotubes. Exellent alignment and position control on nanometer scale can beachieved as well as diameter and growth rate can be controlled using this process. Nanotubes are also produced in mundane places by burning methane, benezene etc in ordinary flames, but they are highly irregular in size and quality.

APPLICATONS
1.Energy storage:
Carbon electrodes are often used in fuel cells and nanotubes having small size,smooth surface topology,fastest electron transfer ratefollowing ideal nernstian behaviour are perfect alternative for electrochemical energy storage. Due to nano size and high surface area available to elestolytes,they are used to form supercapacitors.

2.Electrical Circuits:

Unusual dimension and unusual current conduction mechanism make them ideal component in electrical circuits.Nanotube based transistors are used for digital switching using a single electron. It has also been proposed to form a nano diode by joining two nanotubes of different electrical properties.

3.Structural:

Due to great mechanical strength,nanotubes are used in everyday from clothes,sports gear to cobat jackets to space elevaters.They are also used for structural polymer composites to reinforce the toughness of composites by absorbing energy during their highly flexible behaviour.

4.Templates:

Due to small channels, strong capillary forces exist in nanotubes.Thus it is possible to store gases and liquids in nanotubes.Also,it is possible to perform chemical reactions inside nanotubes thus using it as a nanoreactor.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: 1. A review of current carbon nanotube technologiesby X.E.E. Reynhout Eindhoven University of Technology, Feb 2003

2. Sumio Iijima (1991) ,Helical microtubules of graphitic carbon ,Nature 3. W.Kratschmer at al.(1990) ,Solid c60: A new form of carbon