Signatures of irradiation-induced defects in scanning-tunneling microscopy images of carbon nanotubes

Abstract

Using empirical-potential and tight-binding models, we study the structure and stability of irradiation-induced atomic-scale defects in the walls of carbon nanotubes. We model the temporal evolution of such defects and calculate their lifetimes at various temperatures. We also simulate scanning-tunneling microscopy (STM) images of irradiated nanotubes with such defects. Our simulations indicate that, at low temperatures, the defects live long enough to be detected by STM and that different defects manifest themselves in STM images in different ways, which allows one to distinguish the defects experimentally.