Mechanical buckling of multi-walled carbon nanotubes: The effects of slenderness ratio

Buckling strengths, in terms of compressive strain, of single-, double- and triple-walled carbon nanotubes (CNTs) are investigated to study the effects of slenderness ratio (SR) via the molecular dynamics (MD) simulations with the Tersoff potential. Under constant ratio of slenderness, the CNTs with small SR behave like a continuum shell object. For large SRʹs, multi-walled CNTs exhibit the characteristics of the Euler columns. In addition, smaller nanotubes possess higher buckling-resistance. The buckling strength of multi-walled nanotubes is controlled by the size of their outermost shell.