Pressure-induced phase transformation and structural resilience of single-wall carbon nanotube bundles

We report here an in situ x-ray diffraction investigation of the structural changes in carbon single-wall nanotube bundles under quasihydrostatic pressures up to 13 GPa. In contrast with a recent study [Phys. Rev. Lett. 85, 1887 (2000)] our results show that the triangular lattice of the carbon nanotube bundles continues to persist up to similar to 10 GPa. The lattice is seen to relax just before the phase transformation that is observed at similar to 10 GPa. Further, our results display the reversibility of the two-dimensional lattice symmetry even after compression up to 13 GPa well beyond the 5 GPa value observed recently. These experimental results explicitly validate the predicted remarkable mechanical resilience of the nanotubes.