Near Monochiral Single-Walled Carbon Nanotube Dispersions in Organic Solvents

Abstract

We describe simple procedures to obtain near monochiral samples of several single-walled carbon nanotube (SWNT) species starting from SWNT raw material. (7,5), (7,6), (10,5), and (9,7) nanotubes were obtained with respective enrichments of up to ∼90% (as estimated from photoluminescence and absorption spectra) by their selective dispersion in toluene with various fluorene-based polymers and subsequent centrifugation. Further highly enriched samples, for instance of (6,5) nanotubes, were prepared by implementing density gradient centrifugation of dispersions of SWNTs in organic solvents with 2,4,6-tribromotoluene as the density gradient additive.