2009/01/27 by Qiang Lu, Qiang Lü, Marino Arroyo +1
Engineering · Materials Science · Physics and Astronomy · #Carbon Nanotubes in Composites #Graphene research and applications #Molecular Junctions and Nanostructures #cond-mat.mtrl-sci
paper · pdf · doi:10.1088/0022-3727/42/10/102002
published as J. Phys. D: Appl. Phys. 42, 102002 (2009) · 5 pages, 4 figures
arxiv created 2009/01/27 · openalex publication_date 2009/04/23 · arxiv updated 2015/05/12 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/01
An analytic formula is derived for the elastic bending modulus of monolayer graphene based on an empirical potential for solid-state carbon atoms. Two physical origins are identified for the non-vanishing bending stiffness of the atomically thin graphene sheet, one due to the bond-angle effect and the other resulting from the bond-order term associated with the dihedral angles. The analytical prediction compares closely with ab initio energy calculations. Pure bending of graphene monolayers into cylindrical tubes is simulated by a molecular mechanics approach, showing slight nonlinearity and anisotropy in the tangent bending modulus as the bending curvature increases. An intrinsic coupling between bending and in-plane strain is noted for graphene monolayers rolled into carbon nanotubes.