Theory of Low- and High-Field Transports in Metallic Single-Wall Nanotubes

Abstract

Individual metallic single-wall carbon nanotubes show unusual non-Ohmic transport behaviors at low and high bias fields. For low-resistance contact samples, the differential conductance increases with increasing bias, reaching a maximum at ~ 100 mV . As the bias increases further, drops dramatically [ 1 ]. The higher the bias, the system behaves in a more normal (Ohmic) manner. This low-bias anomaly is temperature-dependent (50 - 150 K). We propose a new interpretation. Supercurrents run in the graphene wall below ~ 150 K . The normal hole currents run on the outer surface of the wall, which are subject to the scattering by phonons and impurities. The currents along the tube length generate circulating magnetic fields and eventually destroy the supercurrent in the wall at high enough bias, and restore the Ohmic behavior. If the prevalent ballistic electron model is adopted, then the temperature-dependent scattering effects cannot be discussed. For the high bias (0.3 - 5 V), (a) the I - V curves are temperature-independent (4 - 150 K), and (b) the currents (magnitudes) saturate. The behavior (a) arises from the fact that the neutral supercurrent below the critical temperature is not accelerated by the electric field. The behavior (b) is caused by the limitation of the number of quantum-states for the “holes” running outside of the tube.