Metal-Catalyst-Free Growth of Single-Walled Carbon Nanotubes on Substrates

Citations Over TimeTop 1% of 2009 papers

Abstract

In this communication, we have demonstrated that SiO(2) nanoparticles can be generated by simply scratching the quartz or silicon wafer with a SiO(2) layer and confirmed it to be active for the growth of SWNTs for the first time. Furthermore, the SWNTs from SiO(2) has a much narrower size distribution. This may open a way to control the diameter of the SWNTs. More importantly, our work has found a series of oxides including Al(2)O(3), TiO(2), and rare earth oxides to be active for SWNT growth as well. These findings not only provide an alternative new type of catalysts for the growth of SWNTs but also give more insight into the role of the catalysts and a deeper understanding of the growth mechanism of SWNTs. The effective catalysts and catalytic activity for SWNT growth seem to be more size-dependent than the catalysts. Long oriented SWNTs generated from these catalysts enable us to rule out the relationship between the catalysts and the structures of the SWNTs. Thus controlled growth of SWNTs including the diameter and chirality is expected to be eventually realized.

Related Papers

• → Flotation of quartz from quartz-feldspar mixtures by the HF method(2016)76 cited
• → Carbon nanotube-induced chirality in an achiral liquid crystal(2010)41 cited
• → On chirality measures and chirality properties(2000)31 cited
• → Chirality, Chirality Transfer and the Chiroclinic Effect(2007)2 cited
• → Investigation of the Quartz Distribution in Electro-Porcelain Materials(2023)1 cited