Eur. Phys. J. B 72, 145-151 (2009)
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjb/e2009-00329-6

X-ray diffraction study of the evolution of Fe-filled multiwalled carbon nanotubes under pressure

¹ Laboratoire de Physique des Solides, UMR CNRS 8502, Université Paris-Sud 11, 91405 Orsay Cedex 5, France
² Laboratoire Francis Perrin, URA CEA-CNRS 2453, DSM-IRAMIS-SPAM, CEA Saclay, 91191 Gif-sur-Yvette, France
³ IMPMC, Université Pierre et Marie Curie – Paris 6, CNRS UMR 7590, 140 rue de Lourmel, 75015 Paris, France
⁴ European Synchrotron Radiation Facility, 38043 Grenoble, France

Corresponding author: ^a cambedouzou@lps.u-psud.fr

Received: 26 June 2009
Revised: 21 August 2009
Published online: 7 October 2009

Abstract

We present in situ high pressure X-ray diffraction experiments on multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWNTs) filled with iron-based nanowires. In addition to our diffraction results, we provide a detailed characterization of our samples in terms of nanotube length, iron contents, nanotube number of walls and radial dimension. Both carbon nanotubes and encapsulated iron-based nanowires were found to be stable under high pressure conditions, in contrast with previous experiments performed on Fe-filled MWNTs where structural transitions of nanotubes and Fe₃C nanowires were recorded around 9 GPa. We point out the importance of providing a complete structural characterization of the studied material and we propose an explanation for the contradictory results found in the literature based on different structural characteristics of the samples and on recent results on the non-hydrostaticity of some pressure transmitting media.