title: Nanofluidic Transport through Isolated Carbon Nanotube Channels: Advances, Controversies, and Challenges.
abstract: Owing to their simple chemistry and structure, controllable geometry, and a plethora of unusual yet exciting transport properties, carbon nanotubes (CNTs) have emerged as exceptional channels for fundamental nanofluidic studies, as well as building blocks for future fluidic devices that can outperform current technology in many applications. Leveraging the unique fluidic properties of CNTs in advanced systems requires a full understanding of their physical origin. Recent advancements in nanofabrication technology enable nanofluidic devices to be built with a single, nanometer-wide CNT as a fluidic pathway. These novel platforms with isolated CNT nanochannels offer distinct advantages for establishing quantitative structure-transport correlations in comparison with membranes containing many CNT pores. In addition, they are promising components for single-molecule sensors as well as for building nanotube-based circuits wherein fluidics and electronics can be coupled. With such advanced device architecture, molecular and ionic transport can be manipulated with vastly enhanced control for applications in sensing, separation, detection, and therapeutic delivery. Recent achievements in fabricating isolated-CNT nanofluidic platforms are highlighted, along with the most-significant findings each platform enables for water, ion, and molecular transport. The implications of these findings and remaining open questions on the exceptional fluidic properties of CNTs are also discussed.
authors.affiliation: 7000 East Ave. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Livermore, CA, 94550.
authors.forename: Shirui
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Guo
authors.affiliation: 7000 East Ave. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Livermore, CA, 94550.
authors.forename: Eric R
authors.initials: ER
authors.lastname: Meshot
authors.affiliation: 67 Cyclotron Rd, The Molecular Foundry, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA, 94720.
authors.forename: Tevye
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Kuykendall
authors.affiliation: 67 Cyclotron Rd, The Molecular Foundry, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA, 94720.
authors.forename: Stefano
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Cabrini
authors.affiliation: 7000 East Ave. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Livermore, CA, 94550.
authors.forename: Francesco
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Fornasiero
keywords: anomalous transport behavior; ionic conductance; nanofluidics; single carbon nanotubes; single molecule translocations