Issue |
EPL
Volume 121, Number 5, March 2018
|
|
---|---|---|
Article Number | 56001 | |
Number of page(s) | 5 | |
Section | Condensed Matter: Structural, Mechanical and Thermal Properties | |
DOI | https://doi.org/10.1209/0295-5075/121/56001 | |
Published online | 09 May 2018 |
A “fullerene-carbon nanotube” structure with tunable mechanical properties
1 Department of Architecture and Civil Engineering, City University of Hong Kong Kowloon, Hong Kong SAR, China
2 Department of Engineering Mechanics, Shanghai Jiao Tong University - Shanghai 2002240, China
(a) lwzhang@sjtu.edu.cn (corresponding author)
Received: 11 December 2017
Accepted: 11 April 2018
Carbon-based nanostructures have drawn tremendous research interest and become promising building blocks for the new generation of smart sensors and devices. Utilizing a bottom-up strategy, the chemical interconnecting sp3 covalent bond between carbon building blocks is an efficient way to enhance its Young's modulus and ductility. The formation of sp3 covalent bond, however, inevitably degrades its ultimate tensile strength caused by stress concentration at the junction. By performing a molecular dynamics simulation of tensile deformation for a fullerene-carbon nanotube (FCNT) structure, we propose a tunable strategy in which fullerenes with various angle energy absorption capacities are utilized as building blocks to tune their ductile behavior, while still maintaining a good ultimate tensile strength of the carbon building blocks. A higher ultimate tensile strength is revealed with the reduction of stress concentration at the junction. A brittle-to-ductile transition during the tensile deformation is detected through the structural modification. The development of ductile behavior is attributed to the improvement of energy propagation ability during the fracture initiation, in which the released energy from bonds fracture is mitigated properly, leading to the further development of mechanical properties.
PACS: 62.25.-g – Mechanical properties of nanoscale systems / 62.20.M- – Structural failure of materials / 91.60.Ba – Elasticity, fracture, and flow
© EPLA, 2018
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