title: Sculpting carbon bonds for allotropic transformation through solid-state re-engineering of -sp2 carbon.
abstract: Carbon forms one of nature's strongest chemical bonds; its allotropes having provided some of the most exciting scientific discoveries in recent times. The possibility of inter-allotropic transformations/hybridization of carbon is hence a topic of immense fundamental and technological interest. Such modifications usually require extreme conditions (high temperature, pressure and/or high-energy irradiations), and are usually not well controlled. Here we demonstrate inter-allotropic transformations/hybridizations of specific types that appear uniformly across large-area carbon networks, using moderate alternating voltage pulses. By controlling the pulse magnitude, small-diameter single-walled carbon nanotubes can be transformed predominantly into larger-diameter single-walled carbon nanotubes, multi-walled carbon nanotubes of different morphologies, multi-layered graphene nanoribbons or structures with sp(3) bonds. This re-engineering of carbon bonds evolves via a coalescence-induced reconfiguration of sp(2) hybridization, terminates with negligible introduction of defects and demonstrates remarkable reproducibility. This reflects a potential step forward for large-scale engineering of nanocarbon allotropes and their junctions.
authors.affiliation: Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, Northeastern University, Boston, Massachusetts 02115, USA.
authors.forename: Hyun Young
authors.initials: HY
authors.lastname: Jung
authors.affiliation: 1] Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA [2] Present address: Department of Physics and Astrophysics, University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, Alabama 35487, USA.
authors.forename: Paulo T
authors.initials: PT
authors.lastname: Araujo
authors.affiliation: Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, Northeastern University, Boston, Massachusetts 02115, USA.
authors.forename: Young Lae
authors.initials: YL
authors.lastname: Kim
authors.affiliation: Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA.
authors.forename: Sung Mi
authors.initials: SM
authors.lastname: Jung
authors.affiliation: Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA.
authors.forename: Xiaoting
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Jia
authors.affiliation: Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, Northeastern University, Boston, Massachusetts 02115, USA.
authors.forename: Sanghyun
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Hong
authors.affiliation: National Nanofab Center, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, 335 Gwahangno, Daejeon 305-806, South Korea.
authors.forename: Chi Won
authors.initials: CW
authors.lastname: Ahn
authors.affiliation: Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA.
authors.forename: Jing
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Kong
authors.affiliation: 1] Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA [2] Department of Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA.
authors.forename: Mildred S
authors.initials: MS
authors.lastname: Dresselhaus
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, Northeastern University, Boston, Massachusetts 02115, USA.
authors.forename: Swastik
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Kar
authors.affiliation: Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, Northeastern University, Boston, Massachusetts 02115, USA.
authors.forename: Yung Joon
authors.initials: YJ
authors.lastname: Jung