Gapping by squashing: Metal-insulator and insulator-metal transitions in collapsed carbon nanotubes

Squashing brings circumferentially separated areas of a carbon nanotube into close proximity, drastically altering the low-energy electronic properties and (in some cases) reversing standard rules for metallic versus semiconducting behavior. Such a deformation mode, not requiring motion of tube ends, may be useful for devices. Uniaxial stress of a few kbar can reversibly collapse a small-radius tube, inducing a 0.1 eV gap with a very strong pressure dependence, while the collapsed state of a larger tube is stable. The low-energy electronic properties of chiral tubes are surprisingly insensitive to collapse.