Mono-Vacancy and B-Doped Defects in Carbon Heterojunction Nanodevices

We present a detailed theoretical study of the behavior of mono-vacancy and B-doped defects in carbon heterojunction nanodevices. We have introduced a complete set of formation energy and surface reactivity calculations, considering a range of different diameters and chiralities of combined carbon nanotubes. We have investigated three distinct combinations of carbon heterojunctions using density functional theory (DFT) and applying B3LYP/3-21g: armchair-armchair herteojunctions, zigzag-zigzag heterojunctions, and zigzag-armchair heterojunctions. We have shown for first time a detailed study of formation energy of mono-vacancy and B-doped defects of carbon heterojunction nanodevices. Our calculations show that the highest surface reactivity is found for the B-doped zigzag-armchair heterojunctions and it is easier to remove the carbon atom from the network of heterojunction armchair-armchair CNTs than the heterojunction zigzag-armchair and zigzag-zigzag CNTs.

The Surface Reactivity of Pure and Monohydrogenated Nanocones Formed from Graphene Sheets

A systematic computational study of surface reactivity for pure and mono-hydrogenated carbon nanocoes (CNCs) formed from graphene sheets as functions of disclination angle, cone size and hydrogenation sites has been investigated through density functional (DFT) calculations and at the B3LYP/3-21G level of theory. Five disclination angles (60°, 120°, 180°, 240° and 300°) are applied and at any disclination angle four structures with different sizes are studied. For comparison, pure and mono-hydrogenated boron nitride nanocones (BNNCs) with disclination angles 60°, 120°, 180°, 240° and 300° are also investigated. The hydrogenation is done on three different sites, HS1 (above the first neighbor atom of the apex atoms), HS2 (above one atom of the apex atoms) and HS3 (above one atom far from the apex atoms). Our calculations show that the highest surface reactivity for pure CNCs and BNNCs at disclination angles 60°, 180° and 300° is 23.50 Debye for B41N49H10 cone and at disclination angles 120° and 240° is 15.30 Debye for C94H14 cone. For mono-hydrogenated CNCs, the highest surface reactivity is 22.17 Debye for C90H10-HS3 cone at angle 300° and for mono-hydrogenated BNNCs the highest surface reactivity is 28.97 Debye for B41N49H10-HS1 cone when the hydrogen atom is adsorbed on boron atom at cone angle 240°.

Effect of Monovacancy Defects on Adsorbing of CO, CO₂, NO and NO₂on Carbon Nanotubes: First Principle Calculations

We have applied density functional theory to investigate different types of carbon nanotubes (armchair (4,4)CNT and zig-zag (7,0)CNT) as sensors of some pollutant gas molecules, especially CO, CO2, NO and NO2. We show, for the first time, that the adsorption of pollutant gas molecules on carbon nanotubes are improved by introducing the monovacancy defects on the surfaces of (7,0)CNT. The adsorption energies, the optimal adsorption positions and the orientation of these gas molecules on the surfaces of carbon nanotubes are studied. It is found that the most adsorbed pollutant gas is NO molecule on (7,0)CNT.