Chirality distribution of single-walled carbon nanotubes grown from gold nanoparticles

Au nanoparticles with diameters about 1.4 nm were dispersed onto porous Si3N4 grids and applied for growing single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) by chemical vapor deposition. Particularly, SWCNTs with diameters in the range of 0.75-1.8 nm were produced at a reaction temperature of 700 degrees C using CO as the carbon precursor. Nanobeam electron diffraction characterizations revealed that most of the SWCNTs have large chiral angles and zigzag SWCNTs were hardly detected. Density functional theory calculations showed that the SWCNT-Au interface formation energy and the SWCNT growth kinetics account for the enrichment of large chiral angle SWCNTs in the product. (C) 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.