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When material dimensions are reduced to the nanoscale, exceptional physical mechanics properties can be obtained that differ significantly from the corresponding bulk materials. Here we review the physical mechanics of the friction of low-dimensional nanomaterials, including zero-dimensional nanoparticles, one- dimensional multiwalled nanotubes and nanowires, and two-dimensional nanomaterials—such as graphene, hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN), and transition-metal dichalcogenides—as well as topological insulators. Nanoparticles between solid surfaces can serve as rolling and sliding lubrication, while the interlayer friction of multiwalled nanotubes can be ultralow or significantly high and sensitive to interwall spacing and chirality matching, as well as the tube materials. The interwall friction can be several orders of magnitude higher in binary polarized h-BN tubes than in carbon nanotubes mainly because of wall buckling. Furthermore, current extensive studies on two-dimensional nanomaterials are comprehensively reviewed herein. In contrast to their bulk materials that serve as traditional dry lubricants (e.g., graphite, bulk h-BN, and MoS2), large-area high- quality monolayered two-dimensional nanomaterials can serve as single-atom-thick coatings that minimize friction and wear. In addition, by appropriately tuning the surface properties, these materials have shown great promise for creating energy-efficient self-powered electro-opto-magneto-mechanical nanosystems. State-of-the- art experimental and theoretical methods to characterize friction in nanomaterials are also introduced.


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Friction of low-dimensional nanomaterial systems

Show Author's information Wanlin GUO1( )Jun YIN1Hu QIU1Yufeng GUO1Hongrong WU1Minmin XUE1
Key Laboratory for Intelligent Nano Materials and Devices of the Ministry of Education, State Key Laboratory of Mechanics and Control of Mechanical Structures, and Institute of Nanoscience, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, 29 Yudao Street, Nanjing 210016, China

Abstract

When material dimensions are reduced to the nanoscale, exceptional physical mechanics properties can be obtained that differ significantly from the corresponding bulk materials. Here we review the physical mechanics of the friction of low-dimensional nanomaterials, including zero-dimensional nanoparticles, one- dimensional multiwalled nanotubes and nanowires, and two-dimensional nanomaterials—such as graphene, hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN), and transition-metal dichalcogenides—as well as topological insulators. Nanoparticles between solid surfaces can serve as rolling and sliding lubrication, while the interlayer friction of multiwalled nanotubes can be ultralow or significantly high and sensitive to interwall spacing and chirality matching, as well as the tube materials. The interwall friction can be several orders of magnitude higher in binary polarized h-BN tubes than in carbon nanotubes mainly because of wall buckling. Furthermore, current extensive studies on two-dimensional nanomaterials are comprehensively reviewed herein. In contrast to their bulk materials that serve as traditional dry lubricants (e.g., graphite, bulk h-BN, and MoS2), large-area high- quality monolayered two-dimensional nanomaterials can serve as single-atom-thick coatings that minimize friction and wear. In addition, by appropriately tuning the surface properties, these materials have shown great promise for creating energy-efficient self-powered electro-opto-magneto-mechanical nanosystems. State-of-the- art experimental and theoretical methods to characterize friction in nanomaterials are also introduced.

Keywords: friction, two-dimensional materials, nanoparticles, nanomaterials, nanotubes, energy dissipation

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Publication history

Received: 22 July 2014
Revised: 28 August 2014
Accepted: 30 August 2014
Published: 11 September 2014
Issue date: September 2014

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© The author(s) 2014

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by The National Key Basic Research and Development (973) Program of China (2013CB932604 and 2012CB933403), The National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 51472117, 11072109, 11472131), the Research Fund of State Key Laboratory of Mechanics and Control of Mechanical Structures (0414K01, 0413G01, 0413Y02), the Jiangsu NSF (BK20131356, BK20130781), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities of China (No. NE2012005), and the Project Funded by the Priority Academic Program Development of Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions.

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