Diameter-Controlled Synthesis of Carbon Nanotubes Using [2n]Collarenes as Rigid Organic Templates

An effective route to diameter-controlled single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) remains elusive. The use of organic templates to precisely control the diameter of the resulting nanotubes holds great promise in this regard but has hitherto had very limited practical success. A main obstacle is the limited availability of suitable organic templates. Here, we report the diameter-controlled bottom-up synthesis of SWCNTs with elaborately designed [2n]collarenes, hydrocarbon belts consisting of alternating phenylene and 1,4-cyclohexadiene rings, as rigid organic templates. A new approach has been developed to construct these collarenes, which are then used as templates in the bottom-up growth of SWCNTs. The resulting SWCNTs exhibit narrow diameter distributions, matching the diameters of the employed collarene templates. This work greatly propels the synthesis of diameter-controlled SWCNTs.