High electron thermal conductivity of chiral carbon nanotubes

Abstract

Solving the Boltzmann kinetic equation with energy dispersion relation obtained in the tight binding approximation, the carrier thermal conductivity Ke of a chiral carbon nanotube (CCNT) was determined. The dependence of Ke on temperature T, chiral geometric angle fa and overlap integrals Az and As were obtained. The results were numerically analysed. Unusually high values of Ke were observed suggesting that ne is nontrivial in the calculation of the thermal conductivity K of CCNT. More interestingly we noted also that at 104 K and for A2 and As values of 0.020 eV and 0.0150 eV respectively the ne value is about 41000 W/mK as reported for a 99.9% pure 12 C crystal. We predict that the electron thermal conductivity of CCNT should exceed 200,000 W/mK at ~ 80 K