2010/04/11 by Chris A. Marianetti, Hannah Yevick, Hannah G. Yevick · 2 citations
Materials Science · Physics and Astronomy · #Boron and Carbon Nanomaterials Research #Carbon Nanotubes in Composites #Composite material #Compression (physics) #Condensed matter physics #Graphene #Graphene research and applications #Instability #Limiting #Materials science #Mechanics #Nanotechnology #Phase (matter) #Phase transition #Phonon #Physics #Quantum mechanics #Soft modes #Stress (linguistics) #Tension (geology) #cond-mat.mes-hall #cond-mat.mtrl-sci
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevlett.105.245502
published as Phys. Rev. Lett. 105, 245502 (2010)
arxiv created 2010/04/11 · openalex publication_date 2010/12/10 · arxiv updated 2013/05/29 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
Recent experiments established pure graphene as the strongest material known to mankind, further invigorating the question of how graphene fails. Using density functional theory, we reveal the mechanisms of mechanical failure of pure graphene under a generic state of tension at zero temperature. One failure mechanism is a novel soft-mode phonon instability of the K1 mode, whereby the graphene sheet undergoes a phase transition and is driven towards isolated hexagonal rings resulting in a reduction of strength. The other is the usual elastic instability corresponding to a maximum in the stress-strain curve. Our results indicate that finite wave vector soft modes can be the key factor in limiting the strength of monolayer materials.