A new molecular motor is conceptually constructed from a double-walled carbon nanotube (DWNT) consisting of a long inner single-walled carbon nanotube (SWNT) and a short outer SWNT with different chirality. The interaction between inner and outer tubes is the sum of the Lennard-Jones potentials between carbon atoms in inner tube and those in outer one. Within the framework of Smoluchowski-Feynman ratchet, it is theoretically shown that this system in an isothermal bath will exhibit a unidirectional rotation in the presence of a varying axial electrical voltage.
@article{arxiv.cond-mat/0501062,
title = {Molecular Motor Constructed from a Double-Walled Carbon Nanotube Driven by Axially Varying Voltage},
author = {Z. C. Tu and X. Hu},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:cond-mat/0501062},
year = {2007}
}