Strain-Modified RKKY Interaction in Carbon Nanotubes

TL;DR

This paper investigates how uniaxial strain influences the RKKY magnetic interaction in carbon nanotubes, revealing that strain can modulate, amplify, or switch the interaction, enabling mechanical control of magnetic properties for spintronic applications.

Contribution

It demonstrates that uniaxial strain can significantly manipulate the RKKY interaction in carbon nanotubes, offering a new way to control magnetic interactions in nanostructures.

Findings

Strain can amplify or attenuate the RKKY interaction.

Strain acts as a switch to turn magnetic interactions on or off.

The decay rate of RKKY interaction in nanotubes differs from graphene.

Abstract

For low-dimensional metallic structures, such as nanotubes, the exchange coupling between localized magnetic dopants is predicted to decay slowly with separation. The long-range character of this interaction plays a significant role in determining the magnetic order of the system. It has previously been shown that the interaction range depends on the conformation of the magnetic dopants in both graphene and nanotubes. Here we examine the RKKY interaction in carbon nanotubes in the presence of uniaxial strain for a range of different impurity configurations. We show that strain is capable of amplifying or attenuating the RKKY interaction, significantly increasing certain interaction ranges, and acting as a switch: effectively turning on or off the interaction. We argue that uniaxial strain can be employed to significantly manipulate magnetic interactions in carbon nanotubes, allowing an interplay between mechanical and magnetic properties in future spintronic devices. We also examine the dimensional relationship between graphene and nanotubes with regards to the decay rate of the RKKY interaction.