Catalyst consumption during growth of carbon nanofilaments on Pd seeds

摘要

Carbon nanofilaments are produced at 600degreesC by catalytic decomposition of acetylene on palladium nanoparticles. We observe that nanofilament length is limited to a few hundreds of nm when the size of Pd germs is less than 10 nm, possibly due to the incorporation of Pd atoms during growth. We propose a growth model, supported by first-principles calculations which show that Pd atoms are stable when adsorbed on graphene and that a charge transfer occurs, modifying significantly the electronic properties. (C) 2004 American Institute of Physics.