Entropy-driven stability of chiral single-walled carbon nanotubes

Abstract

The twisted carbon nanotube story Despite progress in growing single-walled carbon nanotubes of specific size and chirality, the factors that control their growth are still not fully known. Magnin et al. developed a thermodynamic model for the growth of single-walled carbon nanotubes. The model explains the origin of nanotube chirality in terms of the configurational entropy of the nanotube edge. The model should be useful in helping to guide nanotube growth parameters to enhance selectivity. Science , this issue p. 212