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On the Flexural Characteristics of Multi-walled Carbon Nanotubes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 February 2011

Rong Bai
Affiliation:
Polymer Engineering Department, University of Akron, Akron, OH 44236–0301
Justin Molenaur
Affiliation:
Polymer Engineering Department, University of Akron, Akron, OH 44236–0301
R. Byron Pipes
Affiliation:
Schools of Materials Engineering, Aeronautics and Astronautics, and Chemical Engineering Purdue University
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Abstract

We use an analytical solution for bending of coaxial orthotropic cylinders to model the flexural deformation of multi-walled nanotubes with any number of layers. The simulation results show that the bending stiffness of the MWNT increases with the number of nanotube layers. For fixed number of layers, MWNT with larger inner radius has greater bending stiffness. The bending stiffness also increases with out layer radius. For certain outer radius, smaller inner radius results in a larger stiffness. The effective elastic modulus of the MWNT also increases with the number of layers and the outer radius. For the same value of the outer radius, the MWNT with smaller inner radius has a larger effective elastic modulus. As the number of layers increases, the effective modulus approaches the in-plane elastic modulus of graphene. In this work we find that the interface conditions, i.e., perfect bonding or no friction, do not affect the bending stiffness and effective elastic modulus of the MWNT. Furthermore, the cross-section of MWNT does not show any warping under bending, which suggest the classic beam theory is applicable in determining the flexural response of MWNT.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Materials Research Society 2005

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