Electronic properties of peapods: effects of fullerene rotation and different types of tube

Effects of encapsulated fullerene rotation on peapod electronic properties are studied by using Slater-Koster tight-binding calculations. We found that the encapsulated fullerenes can rotate freely in the space of a (10, 10) tube at room temperature, and the rotation of fullerenes will affect C₆₀@(10,10) peapod electronic properties significantly; generally, orientational disorder will remove the sharp features of the average density of states (DOS). However, the rotation of fullerenes cannot induce a metal-insulator transition. Electronic properties of peapods formed by fullerenes and different types of single-walled carbon nanotube (SWNT) are studied too. Percentage calculations suggest that, unlike the multicarrier metallic C₆₀@(10,10) peapod, the C₆₀@(17,0) peapod is a semiconductor, and the effects of the encapsulated fullerenes on tube valence bands and conduction bands are asymmetrical.