Torsional buckling of multi-walled carbon nanotubes

This paper investigates torsional buckling of an individual multi-walled carbon nanotubes. The multiple shell model is adopted and the effect of van der Waals forces between adjacent nanotubes is taken into account. According to the ratio of radius-to-thickness, multi-walled carbon nanotubes discussed here are classified into three cases: thin, thick, and nearly solid. The critical shear stress and the torsional buckling mode are calculated for various radius-to-thickness ratios. Results carried out show that the buckling mode (m, n) corresponding the critical shear stress is sole, which is obviously different from the axially compressed buckling of an individual multi-walled carbon nanotubes. The investigation on torsional buckling of multi-walled carbon nanotubes in this paper may be used as a useful reference for the designs of nano-oscillators, nano-drive devices and actuators in which multi-walled carbon nanotubes act as basic elements.