Dynamic Response of Slacked Single-Walled Carbon Nanotube Resonators

1 23
Nonlinear Dynamics
An International Journal of Nonlinear
Dynamics and Chaos in Engineering
Systems

ISSN 0924-090X
Volume 67
Number 2

Nonlinear Dyn (2012) 67:1419-1436
DOI 10.1007/s11071-011-0078-3
Dynamic response of slacked single-walled
carbon nanotube resonators
Hassen M.Ouakad & Mohammad
I.Younis
1 23
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Nonlinear Dyn (2012) 67:14191436
DOI 10.1007/s11071-011-0078-3
ORI GI NAL PAPER
Dynamic response of slacked single-walled carbon nanotube
resonators
Hassen M. Ouakad Mohammad I. Younis
Received: 19 January 2011 / Accepted: 9 May 2011 / Published online: 4 June 2011
Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
Abstract This paper presents an investigation of the
dynamics of electrically actuated single-walled car-
bon nanotube (CNT) resonators including the effect of
their initial curvature due to fabrication (slack). A non-
linear shallow arch model is utilized. A perturbation
method, the method of multiple scales, is used to ob-
tain analytically the forced vibration response due to
DC and small AC loads for various slacked CNTs of
higher and lower aspect ratio. Results of the perturba-
tion method are veried with those obtained by nu-
merically integrating the equations of a multi-mode
reduced-order model based on the Galerkin procedure.
The effective nonlinearity of the CNT is calculated
as a function of the slack level and the DC load. To
handle computational problems associated with CNTs
of small radiuses, results based on a nonlinear cable
model are also demonstrated. The results have indi-
cated that the quadratic nonlinearity due to slack has
dominant effect on the dynamic behavior of the CNT.
Keywords Carbon nanotube Resonator NEMS
Arch Effective nonlinearity Softening Hardening
H.M. Ouakad M.I. Younis ()
Department of Mechanical Engineering, State University
of New York at Binghamton, Binghamton, NY 13902,
USA
e-mail: myounis@binghamton.edu
1 Introduction
With the increasing interest in using nanoelectrome-
chanical systems (NEMS) [1, 2] as resonators, switches
and actuators, carbon nanotubes (CNTs), with their
unique electrical and mechanical properties (con-
ductive and stiff structures), have been an attractive
choice for such purposes. Therefore, and since their
discovery [3], CNTs have been under extensive re-
search [319]. Beside their interesting mechanical and
electrical properties, electrically actuated CNTs were
shown to have rich nonlinear behavior characterized
by inherent nonlinear response even for small electric
loads [4] as well as a wide range of tunability of their
natural frequencies with the DC load [5].
Many groups have attempted to investigate the
vibration of CNTs under several dynamic loadings
[419]. Postma et al. [4] used a nonlinear model of
a clamped-clamped beam along with a Galerkin pro-
cedure to study the dynamics of CNTs. Postma et al.
concluded that CNTs are almost useless in the lin-
ear regime even for small electric load. Qu et al. [6]
studied the nonlinear vibration of a multi-walled CNT
based on an elastic multi-layer shell model. Isacsson
and Kinaret [7] modeled the parametric excitation of
an array of cantilever CNTs excited by DC and AC
excitations. They showed that both transverse and lon-
gitudinal parametric resonances can be excited in ad-
dition to primary resonances. Isacsson et al. [8] used a
perturbation theory to study the dynamics of a can-
tilever CNT resonator and to determine analytically
Author's personal copy
1420 H.M. Ouakad, M.I. Younis
the frequency response of the system. Georgantzinos
et al. [9] proposed a linear springmass model to de-
scribe and evaluate the vibration characteristics of a
single walled CNT. They observed that the aspect ra-
tio plays signicant role in the basic modes of vi-
bration. Conley et al. [10] proposed a model for a
CNT accounting for both the in-plane and out-of-plane
motions. They reported a possibility of non-planar
motions that are attributed to the symmetry and the
stretching of the CNT while deforming. Rhoads et al.
[11] introduced linear and nonlinear parametric exci-
tation to the system of [10] to study the 2D nonlinear
oscillations of the CNT. Recently, Ouakad and You-
nis [12] investigated using a Galerkin procedure the
nonlinear dynamic behavior of electrically actuated
CNT resonators. They showed complex nonlinear dy-
namics phenomena, such as hysteresis, dynamic pull-
in, hardening and softening behaviors, and frequency
bands with an inevitable escape from a potential well.
Hawwa and Al-Qahtani [13] studied the primary reso-
nance of a double-walled carbon nanotube under a lin-
ear harmonic excitation using the Galerkin approach.
They showed several transitions from quasi-periodic
to chaotic behavior accompanied with some nonlinear
jump phenomena and nonlinear bifurcations leading to
chaos.
Most of the previous literature works model
clampedclamped CNTs to be perfectly straight. How-
ever, due to their fabrication process using chemical
vapor deposition, fabricating perfectly straight CNTs
with controlled geometry and orientation is difcult.
Indeed, many studies have indicated that clamped-
clamped CNTs are fabricated with some level of cur-
vature (slack) [1419]. Gibson et al. [14] stressed the
importance of slack in modeling the mechanics of
CNTs. Sazonova et al. [15] and Sazonova [16] re-
ported experimental investigations showing the im-
portance of slack on estimating accurately the vibra-
tional behavior of CNTs. stnel et al. [17] investi-
gated theoretically the effect of slack on a CNT os-
cillator. Garcia-Sanchez et al. [18] modeled the CNT
using a nite-element method. They reported discrep-
ancy among their theoretically predicted and experi-
mentally measured resonance frequencies of electro-
statically actuated CNTs and cited slack as a possible
reason of this. Mayoof and Hawwa [19] utilized a non-
linear curved beam model to describe the nonlinear
dynamics of a slacked single-walled carbon nanotube
under linear harmonic excitation. Their reduced equa-
tions boiled to the Dufng equations. They showed
several scenarios of chaotic behavior of the CNT.
From the aforementioned review, one can note that
a robust understanding of the role of various nonlinear-
ities affecting the response of CNTs is still missing.
It is well known that curvature of arches introduces
quadratic and cubic nonlinearities. In addition, electro-
static forces are inherently nonlinear. The interaction
of these nonlinearities (how they compete, strengthen,
or cancel each other) still is not fully understood. The
objective of this paper is to investigate in depth the
nonlinearities of single-walled CNTs and their effects
on the dynamics while varying the slack level and the
DC voltages starting from very small voltage up to the
pull-in instability.
The organization of this paper is as follows. First, a
nonlinear arch model is presented to model the motion
of a slacked CNT. Then, a reduced-order model is de-
rived to solve the equations of motion. The eigenvalue
problem of CNTs under the actuation of a DC load is
solved. The method of multiple scales is then used to
discretize the systemequations and to calculate analyt-
ically the effective nonlinearity of the CNT with slack
and the DC load. Finally, a cable model is adopted for
the case of CNTs with small radius, and perturbation
results are shown.
2 Problem formulation
In this section, we formulate the problem governing
the static and dynamic behavior of an electrically ac-
tuated slacked single-walled carbon nanotube, Fig. 1.
The nanotube is actuated by an electrode underneath
it with a gap width d. It is modeled as a cylindrical
EulerBernoulli beam of radius

R, shell thickness h,
and length L. It has a cross-sectional area A and an
area moment of inertia I . The nanotube is assumed to
have a Young modulus E and a mass density . The
CNT is considered here to be initially curved in the
direction of the lower electrode with an initial shape
w
0
( x) =b
o
sin
2
( x/L).
The equation describing the deection w( x,

t ) of
the clamped-clamped CNT can be written as [20, 21]
EI
4
w
x
4
+A
2
w
t
2
+ c
w
t
=
EA
2L
__
L
0
__
w
x
_
2
2
_
w
x
__
dx
_
Dynamic response of slacked single-walled carbon nanotube resonators 1421
Fig. 1 Schematic of the initially curved carbon nanotube
2
w
x
2

d
2
w
0
d x
2
_
+

F
e
, (1)
where the electrostatic force

F
e
is expressed as [20]
F
e
=

0
(V
DC
+V
AC
cos(

t ))
2
_
(d w w
0
)(d w w
0
+2

R)(cosh
1
(1 +
d w w
0
R
))
2
.
(2)
In (1),

t is time, c is the viscous damping coefcient,
and
0
is the air permittivity.
The boundary conditions are:
w(0,

t ) = 0,
w
x
(0,

t ) = 0, w(L,

t ) = 0,
w
x
(L,

t ) = 0. (3)
Before proceeding further, it should be mentioned
that the continuum mechanics beam theory of (1) is
valid as long as the following conditions are satis-
ed [2224]:
a
c
/L 1;
d
NT
/L 1;
where d
NT
is the CNT diameter and a
c
is the width of
the hexagonal carbon rings, which is estimated to be
near 0.24 nm. In addition, to comply with the shallow
arch theory, the initial curvature of the arch (the slack)
needs to remain small, i.e., b
0
/L < 0.1. For the con-
sidered case studies of this paper, these conditions are
satised.
For convenience, we introduce the following nondi-
mensional variables:
w =
w
d
, x =
x
L
, t =

t
T
, (4)
where T is a time constant dened by T =
_
(AL
4
)/(EI). By substituting (4) into (1)(3),
the nondimensional equations of motion and associ-
ated boundary conditions of the considered clamped-
clamped CNT are written as
4
w
x
4
+

2
w
t
2
+c
w
t
=
2
F
e
+
1
__
1
0
__
w
x
_
2
_
w
x
dw
0
dx
__
dx
_
2
w
x
2

d
2
w
0
dx
2
_
, (5)
w(0, t ) = 0,
w
x
(0, t ) = 0, w(1, t ) = 0,
(6)
w
x
(1, t ) = 0,
where
F
e
=
(V
DC
+V
AC
cos(t ))
2
(1 w w
0
)(1 w w
0
+2R)(cosh
1
(1 +
1ww
0
R
))
2
(7a)
w
0
(x) =
b
o
d
sin
2
(x) (7b)
1
=
Ad
2
2I
,
2
=

0
L
4
EId
2
, c =
cL
4
EIT
,
(8)
=
_
(EI)/(AL
4
)
, R =
R
d
.
3 The reduced-order model
To solve the obtained nondimensional equation of
motion with its associated boundary conditions of
the slacked CNT, (5)(7b) are discretized using the
Galerkin procedure to yield a Reduced-Order Model
(ROM) [12, 25]. Hence, the response of the CNT is
approximated as
w(x, t ) =
n
i=1
i
(t )
i
(x), (9)
where
i
(x) are the normalized linear undamped
mode shapes of a straight beam and
i
(t ) are the
nondimensional modal coordinates.
To obtain the ROM, we substitute (9) into (5)
(7b), multiply by
i
(x), use the orthogonality condi-
tions of the mode shapes, and then integrate the out-
come from 0 to 1. The results are differential equa-
tions in terms of the modal coordinates
i
(t ). To sim-
ulate the dynamic behavior, the obtained ROM can be
integrated in time using RungeKutta technique. We
should mention here that the mode shapes
i
(x) will
remain embedded inside the denominator of the elec-
trostatic force term of (7a) in the ROM. To deal with
the complicated integral terms due to that electrostatic
force, we evaluate the spatial integrals containing the
mode shapes
i
(x) numerically simultaneously while
integrating the differential equations of the modal co-
ordinates
i
(t ).
To calculate the static deection w
s
of the CNT, all
time-dependent terms in the ROM differential equa-
tions are set to zero. Then the modal coordinates
i
(t )
are replaced by unknown constant coefcients a
i
. This
results in a system of nonlinear algebraic equations in
terms of those coefcients. The system is then solved
numerically using the NewtonRaphson method.
4 The eigenvalue problem of slacked CNTs
4.1 Derivations
We rst investigate the eigenvalue problem of the
slacked CNT by calculating the variation of the nat-
ural frequencies with and without slack and under the
actuation of the DC voltage. Toward this, we consider
the ROM obtained in Sect. 3 which can be represented
in a state-space form as
X = R(X) , (10)
where
X = [
1
,
2
, . . . ,
n
], (11)
is the vector of the modal amplitudes and R(X) is a
right-hand side vector representing the stiffness coef-
cients. R(X) is a nonlinear function of the modal coor-
dinates
i
(t ). Note here that we consider the symmet-
ric and antisymmetric mode shapes in the ROM to get
all the possible natural frequencies and mode shapes
of the slacked CNT.
Next, we split X into a static component X
s
, repre-
senting the equilibrium position due to the DC actua-
tion, and a dynamic component (t ) representing the
dynamic perturbation around the equilibrium position,
that is:
X = X
s
+(t ). (12)
Then, substituting (12) into (10), using the Taylor se-
ries expansion assuming small (t ), eliminating the
higher-order terms, and using the fact that R(X
s
) = 0,
we get the following equation:
= J(X
s
) , (13)
where J(X
s
) is the Jacobian matrix calculated at the
equilibrium points [26].
To calculate the natural frequencies of the slacked
CNT for a given voltage, we substitute the static sta-
ble solution, X
s
, into the matrix J and then nd its
corresponding eigenvalues. The eigenvalues are calcu-
lated by solving the following characteristic equation,
which gives an algebraic equation for the eigenvalue :
det (J(X
s
) I) = 0, (14)
where I is the identity matrix and det refers to the
determinant. Then by taking the square root of each
individual eigenvalue, we obtain the natural frequen-
cies of the CNT.
4.2 Results
As a case study, a non-hollow CNT of L = 1000 nm,
R = 5 nm, d = 200 nm, Young modulus E = 1 TPa,

and mass density = 1.3 g/cm
3
is considered. In the
following gures we denote the natural frequencies by
i
(i = 1, 2, 3, . . .).
Figure 2 shows the effect of varying the initial rise
on the natural frequencies of the considered CNT, as-
suming zero DCload. One can see clearly that the even
frequencies (dashed lines in Fig. 2) are insensitive to
the variation of slack whereas the odd frequencies vary
with slack (continuous lines in Fig. 2). These frequen-
cies do not intersect (the circle in Fig. 2); they diverge
in a manner called curve veering [2731]. This phe-
nomenon is common and has been cited for the natural
frequencies of a rectangular membrane when varying
the ratio of its sides lengths [28] and also for the nat-
ural frequencies of cables when varying their sagging
levels [29, 30]. The intersection of the odd and even
frequencies arises because the mode shape of the odd
frequencies of symmetric shape is very sensitive to the
slack level which directly affects the possible stretch-
ing of the CNT, unlike the even modes of antisymmet-
ric shapes.
The results of Fig. 2 agree qualitatively with those
of stnel et al. [17], who derived approximate analyt-
ical expressions of the natural frequencies of the CNT
for several behavior regimes of the CNT depending on
the gate voltage. They identied three zones, and ac-
Fig. 2 Variation of the natural frequencies of a CNT with
various levels of slack at zero DC load showing the crossing
and veering of the frequencies. Solid line () and dashed line
(- - - - -) denote, respectively, the odd and the even frequencies
cordingly developed three discrete models for the re-
sponse, are: bending dominated, catenary dominated,
and elastic dominated. Unlike the model in [17], our
approach is a unied model that can describe the non-
linear oscillations of the CNT under its various param-
eters without dividing the CNT behavior into different
regimes. Further, the model of [17] is applicable only
when the strain is small enough so that the nonlinear
elastic effects may be ignored. The reader is referred to
[24] for further discussion on the natural frequencies
of slacked CNTs under electrostatic actuation.
Next, the variation of the natural frequencies of the
CNT with the DC load is investigated. First, we con-
sider the unslacked case. One can see from Fig. 3(a)
that all the natural frequencies are sensitive to the vari-
ation of the DC voltage. All of them are increased dra-
matically, with a sub-linear variation behavior, except
for the rst frequency near pull-in where it drops to
zero. In addition, one can see from Fig. 3(a) that there
is no possibility of modes veering or modes crossing
even for small range of voltages. These scenarios how-
ever appear when slack is added, Fig. 3(b). This gure
shows the variation of the rst few frequencies of the
slacked CNT (b
0
= 80 nm) with the DC load. We can
see that the odd modes exhibit the frequency veering
phenomenon (circle in Fig. 3(b)), but in this case from
the higher to the lower modes. There are also possi-
bilities of odd and even modes crossings (arrows in
Fig. 3 Variation of the natural frequencies with the DC load of a CNT (a) without slack, and (b) with 80 nm slack. Solid line () and
dashed line (- - - - -) denote the odd and even frequencies, respectively
Fig. 3(b)). To better understand this behavior, one can
note from Fig. 2 that at b
0
= 80 nm, the frequency at
the veering line is
3
. Hence, the mode shape of this
frequency takes a prole close to the rst mode shape,
which becomes very sensitive to the electrostatic ac-
tuation [24]. Upon the application of V
DC
,
3
is de-
creased due to the softening effect of the electrostatic
force, and hence is dragged toward
1
. Hence, veering
occurs between
3
and
1
.
5 Perturbation analysis
5.1 Derivations
This section deals with the dynamic response of the
slacked CNT when subjected to DC and small AC
loads. Perturbation analysis is carried out using the
method of multiple scales and a direct attack of the
equations of motion [32, 33], (5)(7b). To this end, we
dene the following variables for the time scale (T
i
)
and their derivatives (D
i
):
T
0
=t, D
0
=

T
0
, T
1
=t, D
1
=

T
1
,
(15)
T
2
=
2
t, D
2
=

T
2
.
Next, in order for the inuence of the damping and the
forcing balance each other and the nonlinearities of the
system [32], they are ordered as
c =
2
c, V
AC
=
3
V
AC
, (16)
where is a bookkeeping parameter to help scale the
parameters and variables of the problem. Next, we
seek a solution in the form
w(x, t, ) = w
s
(x) +u(x, t )
= w
s
(x) +u
1
(x, T
0
, T
2
) +
2
u
2
(x, T
0
, T
2
)
+
3
u
3
(x, T
0
, T
2
) + , (17)
where w
s
is the static component of the CNT deec-
tion and u is its dynamic component.
For simplicity, we dene
(f (x), g(x)) =
_
1
0
_
f
(x)g
(x)
_
dx, (18)
Next, we expand the electrostatic force term, (7), into
Taylor series up to the third order as
1
_
(1 u w
s
w
0
)(1 u w
s
w
0
+2

R)(cosh
1
(1 +
1uw
s
w
0
R
))
2
F
s
+F
1
u +F
2
u
2
+F
3
u
3
+ .
(19)
Substituting (15)(19) into (5)(7) and equating like
powers of yields
Order
0
: (the static equation)
w
iv
s
=
1
_
w
s
w
0
_
[(w
s
, w
s
) 2(w
s
, w
0
)] +F
s
,
(20)
w
s
(0) = w
s
(1) = 0, w
s
(0) =w
s
(1) = 0,
Order
1
:
L(u
1
) = D
2
0
u
1
+u
iv
1

1
[(w
s
, w
s
)
2(w
s
, w
0
)]u
1
2
1
_
w
s
w
0
_
[(w
s
, u
1
) (w
0
, u
1
)]
2
F
1
u
1
= 0, (21)
Order
2
:
L(u
2
) =
1
(u
1
, u
1
)
_
w
s
w
0
_
+2
1
[(w
s
, u
1
) (w
0
, u
1
)]u
1
+F
2
u
2
1
,
(22)
Order
3
:
L(u
3
) = 2D
0
D
2
u
1
cD
0
u
1
+2
1
(u
1
, u
2
)
_
w
s
w
0
_
+2
1
[(w
s
, u
1
)
(w
0
, u
1
)]u
2
+2
1
[(w
s
, u
2
) (w
0
, u
2
)]u
1
+
1
(u
1
, u
1
)u
1
+2
2
V
DC
V
AC
F
s
cos(t ) +
2
F
2
u
1
u
2
+
2
F
1
u
3
1
. (23)
The solution of (21) is assumed to consist of only the
directly excited mode,
i
(x), because in the absence
of internal resonances all the other modes die out with
damping [32]. This means that this analysis does not
apply where there is potential energy transfer among
the modes, such as near frequency crossing and fre-
quency veering, as demonstrated in Figs. 2 and 3. Ac-
cordingly, we express the rst dynamic component u
1
as
u
1
(x, T
0
, T
2
) =
_
A(T
2
)e
i
i
T
0
+

A(T
2
)e
i
i
T
0
_
i
(x),
(24)
where A(T
2
) is a complex-valued function, the over-
bar denotes the complex conjugate, and
i
and
i
(x)
are the natural frequency and corresponding eigen-
function of the directly excited mode, respectively.
Substituting (24) into (22) gives
L(u
2
) =
_
2A

A+A
2
e
2i
i
T
0
+

A
2
e
2i
i
T
0
_
h(x), (25)
where
h(x) = 2
1
((w
s
,
i
) (w
0
,
i
))
i
+
1
(
i
,
i
)
_
w
s
w
0
_
+
2
F
2
2
i
. (26)
The solution of (25) can be expressed as
u
2
(x, T
0
, T
2
) =
1
(x)A
2
(T
2
)e
2i
i
T
0
+2
2
(x)A(T
2
)

A(T
2
)
+
1
(x)

A
2
(T
2
)e
2i
i
T
0
, (27)
where
1
and
2
are the solutions of the following
boundary-value problems:
H(
j
, 2
i
1j
) =h(x), j = 1, 2,
j
= 0 and
j
= 0 at x = 0 and x = 1, (28)
j = 1, 2,
where
ij
is the Kronecker delta operator and the linear
differential operator H is dened as
H(f (x), ) = f
iv
(x)
2
f (x) 2
1
_
w
s
w
0
_
[(f (x), w
s
) (f (x), w
0
)]
1
[(w
s
, w
s
) 2(w
0
, w
s
)]
f
(x)
2
F
1
f (x). (29)
Note here that the eigenfunction
i
(x)is the solution
of
H(
i
, ) = 0. (30)
In order to describe the nearness of the excitation fre-
quency to the fundamental natural frequency
i
, we
introduce a detuning parameter dened by
=
i
+
2
. (31)
Substituting (24), (27), and (31) into (23) yields
L(u
3
) =
_
i
i
(2A
+cA)
i
(x) +(x)A
2

A
+

F(x)e
iT
2
_
e
i
i
T
0
+cc +NST, (32)
where
F(x) = 2
2
V
DC
V
AC
F
s
. (33)
In (32), A
denotes the derivative of A with respect to

T
2
, cc denotes the complex conjugate of the preceding
terms, NST stands for the terms that do not produce
secular terms, and (x) is dened by
(x) =
1
i
[3(
i
,
i
) +2(w
s
,
1
)
2(w
0
,
1
) +4(w
s
,
2
) 4(w
0
,
2
)]
+
1
_
w
s
w
0
_
[2(
i
,
1
) +4(
i
,
2
)]
+2
1
_
1
+2
2
_
[(
i
, w
s
) (
i
, w
0
)]
+3
2
F
3
3
i
+2
2
F
2
1
+4
2
F
2
2
.
(34)
Note that the function (x) can be divided into two
components describing the nonlinear terms presented
in the considered electrically actuated CNT slacked
resonator as follows:
(x) =
c
(x) +
q
(x),
where
c
(x) = 3
1
i
(
i
,
i
) +,
q
(x) = 3
1
i
_
2(w
s
,
1
) 2(w
0
,
1
)
+4(w
s
,
2
) 4(w
0
,
2
)
_
+
1
_
w
s
w
0
_ _
2(
i
,
1
) +4(
i
,
2
)
_
+2
1
_
1
+2
2
_
[(
i
, w
s
) (
i
, w
0
)]
+2
2
F
2
1
+4
2
F
2
2
.
The subscripts c and q denote the cubic nonlinear
term and the quadratic nonlinear term, respectively.
Next, multiplying the right-hand side of (32) by
i
(x)e
i
i
T
0
, where
i
is normalized such that
_
1
0

2
i
dx = 1, integrating the result from x = 0 to
x = 1, and equating the secular terms to zero yield
the following solvability condition:
i(2A
+cA) +SA
2

A+Fe
iT
2
= 0, (35)
where
F =
_
1
0
i

F dx, and S =S
c
+S
q
, (36)
and the nonlinear coefcients are expressed as follows:
S
c
=
_
1
0
c
dx, S
q
=
_
1
0
q
dx.
Next, we express A in the polar form A = ae
i
/2,
where a = a(T
2
) and = (T
2
) are real-valued func-
tions, representing, respectively, the amplitude and
phase of the response. Substituting the expression of
A into (35) and letting =T
2
, we obtain
__
ia
+a

1
2
ica
_
i
+
_
a
3
8
_
S
_
e
i
+Fe
iT
2
= 0. (37)
Separating the real and imaginary parts in (37), we ob-
tain the following modulation equations:
(38)
_
a
=
1
2
ca +
sin
i
F,
a
=a +
a
3
8
i
S +
cos
i
F. (39)
Substituting (24) and (27) into (17) and setting =
1 yield, to the second-order approximation, the CNT
response to the external excitation
w(x, t ) = w
s
(x) +a cos(t )
i
(x)
+
1
2
a
2
[
1
(x) cos 2(t )
+
2
(x)] + (40)
It follows from (40) that periodic solutions correspond
to constants a and ; that is, the xed points (a
0
,
0
)
of (38)(39). Thus, letting
= 0 and a
= 0 in (38)
(39), and eliminating
0
yield the following frequency-
response equation:
F
2
2
i
=a
2
0
__
+
a
2
0
8
i
S
_
2
+
1
4
c
2
_
, (41)
where c = 2
i
.
One can see from (41) that the frequency response
amplitude depends on the forcing coefcient F, the
effective nonlinearity coefcient S, the natural fre-
quency
i
, and the damping ratio . Next, we eval-
uate numerically the parameters
i
,
i
,
1
,
2
, and
w
s
associated with (36) using a ROM similar to
that in Sect. 3. Once these parameters are computed,
frequency-response curves can be generated using
(40) and (41).
5.2 Results
One important advantage of the perturbation analysis
is that it enables studying the variation of the effective
nonlinearity of the system analytically. We consider
as a case study a non-hollow CNT of L = 1000 nm,
d = 100 nm, Young modulus E = 1 TPa, and mass
density = 1.3 g/cm
3
. First, we study the effect of the
DC load on the CNT nonlinearity for three different
radiuses (10, 20 and 30 nm), Fig. 4. The gure shows
clearly that the ratio of the DC load to the pull-in volt-
age needed to switch from hardening to softening be-
havior increases with the increase of the CNT radius.
This percentage is calculated to be 16%for the CNT of
10 nm radius, 43% for the CNT of 20 nm radius, and
65% for the CNT of 30 nm radius. One reason for this
is that with the increase of the CNT radius, the ratio of
the nondimensional cubic nonlinearity parameter over
the quadratic one of (8),
1
/
2
, increases indicating
that the hardening behavior becomes more dominant.
One can also see the increase of the cubic nonlinear
coefcient (S
c
) with the increase of the CNT radius,
which turns out to be more dominant over a wide range
of DC load. It is clear that the effective nonlinear-
ity switches from positive to negative only when the
Fig. 4 Variation of the effective nonlinearity of the fundamen-
tal mode ( ), the cubic nonlinearity coefcient (), and the
quadratic nonlinearity coefcient () for an unslacked CNT
with the DC voltage: (a)

R = 10 nm, (b)

R = 20 nm, and
(c)

R = 30 nm. The dashed line ( ) separates the positive
and negative regimes of the effective nonlinearity describing,
respectively, the hardening and the softening behaviors of the
CNT
quadratic nonlinear term (S
q
) starts to strengthen with
the continuing increase of the DC load.
Next, the case study of slacked CNT is considered.
For this, consider a non-hollow CNT of L = 1000 nm,
R = 5 nm, d = 200 nm, E = 1 TPa, and = 1.3

g/cm
3
. Figure 5 shows the variation of the effective
nonlinearity coefcient of the fundamental mode (S)
of the CNT with the slack. For the case of small
slack (b
o
< 4 nm), S is positive indicating a hard-
ening behavior and then it switches to negative sign
(b
o
> 4 nm) indicating softening type behavior. This
indicates that for tiny slack level, the CNT is locally
dominated by a softening-type behavior, which means
that the quadratic nonlinearities due to the initial cur-
vature and electrostatic force dominate the dynamic
behavior of the slacked CNT (S
q
is dominant for high
Fig. 5 (a) Variation of the
effective nonlinearity of the
fundamental mode ( ),
the cubic nonlinearity
coefcient (), and the
quadratic nonlinearity
coefcient () of the CNT
with the slack level.
(b) A zoomed view of
(a) showing the transition
of the effective nonlinearity
from positive to negative
Fig. 6 Frequency-response curves of (a) 2 nm and (b) 5 nm slacked CNT showing hardening and softening behaviors respectively.
Results are shown for V
DC
=V
AC
= 1 V and a quality factor of 100
values of b
o
). Note that a slacked CNT gets closer to
the lower electrode amplifying the quadratic effect of
the electrostatic force.
To conrm the qualitative behavior of the frequen-
cy-response curve predicted based on Fig. 5, we use
the reduced-order model developed in Sect. 3 and in-
tegrate in time the differential equations of motion in
terms of the modal coordinates
i
(t ) to obtain the
forced response of the slacked CNT under small DC
voltage and an AC harmonic load. Parts (a) and (b)
of Fig. 6 show the responses of 2 and 5 nm slacked
CNT, respectively. One can see from the gures that
the dynamic response of the CNT switches from being
hardening for the rst case to softening for the second
case, in agreement with the conclusions of Fig. 5.
Next, we show the variation of the effective non-
linearity coefcients with DC load for the case of no
initial curvature, Fig. 7. For small DC load (V
DC
<
10 nm), S is positive indicating a hardening behavior
and then it switches to negative sign (V
DC
> 10 nm)
indicating softening behavior. This shows that the con-
sidered CNT is dominated by a softening behavior
once the DC load exceeds a small voltage compared to
the pull-in. Next, this result is conrmed through nu-
merical integration of the ROM. Figure 8 shows quan-
titative comparison between the frequency response
curves obtained by perturbation based on (40) and
(41), and these generated from numerical integration
of the ROM in Sect. 3. The results of both approaches,
the perturbation and numerical integration, agree qual-
itatively in predicting whether the response is of hard-
quadratic nonlinearity coefcient () of the unslacked CNT
with the DC voltage
ening or of softening type, in agreement with the pre-
diction of Fig. 7. However, the quantitative agreement
is good only for small range of deection, which is ex-
pected since the perturbation solution does not apply
for large range of deection.
Next, the impact of the combined DC voltage and
slack level on the effective nonlinearity coefcients is
studied. Figure 9 shows that for nonzero slack (80 nm),
S is always negative, indicating a softening-type be-
havior of the slacked CNT. This result indicates that
Fig. 8 Frequency-response curves of unslacked CNT for (a) V
DC
= 8 V and (b) V
DC
= 14 V showing hardening and softening
behaviors, respectively. Results are shown for V
AC
= 0.2 V and a quality factor of 100
quadratic nonlinearity coefcient () for the 80 nm slacked
CNT with the DC voltage
the fundamental mode of a slacked CNT is locally
dominated by a softening-type behavior demonstrating
that the quadratic nonlinearities of the initial curvature
and the electrostatic force dominate the dynamic be-
havior of the slacked CNT.
Fig. 10 Comparison between the variations of the dimensional
fundamental natural frequency of the unslacked CNT with the
DC voltage using the beam model () and the cable model (!)
6 The cable model
6.1 Motivation and formulation
For some specic CNTs geometry, especially that of
small radius (i.e., with big aspect ratio), the beam
model experiences numerical problems, especially
when trying to solve the boundary-value problems of
(28)(30). The algorithm used to calculate the effec-
tive nonlinearity coefcient based on the beam model
Fig. 11 Variation of the
effective nonlinearity of the
CNT with slack
Fig. 12 Frequency-response curves of (a) 0.5 nmand (b) 1.5 nmslacked CNT showing hardening and softening behaviors respectively.
Results are shown for V
DC
=V
AC
in Sect. 2 works only for small DCload (near the bend-
ing dominated regime). This convergence problem re-
ects a physical fact that for CNTs of small radius,
bending stiffness is dominant only for small range of
DC load [1517]. It becomes negligible compared to
the stretching stiffness as the DC load is increased.
This is evident from Figs. 2 and 3, which show the
nondimensional natural frequency of the CNT ampli-
ed by thousands of multiples as the electrostatic load
is increased. Thus effectively in this case, the CNT
becomes more or less a cable or a string with a stiff-
ness dominated mostly by the amount of tension or
stretching. This observation served also the base for
the model of stnel et al. [17]. Hence, we use next a
cable model in which we eliminate the bending term
in (5). This yields the following nondimensional equa-
tion of motion and associated boundary conditions:
2
w
t
2
+c
w
t
=
2
F
e
+
1
__
1
0
__
w
x
2
_
w
x
dw
0
dx
___
dx
_
2
w
x
2

d
2
w
0
dx
2
_
, (42)
w(0, t ) = 0, w(1, t ) = 0, (43)
where F
e
and w
0
are given by (7), and the nondimen-
sional parameters are dened as
1
=
EAd
2
2L
2
,
2
=

0
L
2
d
2
,
(44)
c =
c
_
AL
2
, =

_
AL
2
, R =
R
d
.
6.2 Results
As a case study of a CNT with small radius and
high aspect ratio, a hollow nanotube of L = 3000 nm,
h = 0.34 nm,

R = 1 nm, d = 500 nm, E = 1.2 TPa,
and = 1.35 g/cm
3
is considered. Such dimensions
are typical of CNTs with slack [15, 16]. We rst com-
pare between the variations of the dimensional funda-
mental natural frequency of the considered CNT with
small radius while using both models (the beam and
the string model) for the case of zero slack. It can be
seen from Fig. 10 that for a wide range of DC load
(5V < V
DC
< 60 V), between the bending dominated
regime and the pull-in zone, the cable and the beam
models are in good agreement. Accordingly, next we
will use the perturbation analysis derived in Sect. 5.1
while considering the beam model for small DC load,
and use the cable model for higher values of the DC
load.
Fig. 13 Variation of the effective nonlinearity coefcient S of the unslacked CNT with the DC voltage while using (a) a beam model,
and (b) a cable model. Figures (c) and (d) show frequency-response curves of unslacked CNT for V
DC
= 0.04 V and V
DC
= 0.2 V,
respectively, showing hardening and softening behaviors. Results are shown for V
AC
Next, we simulate the variation of the effective non-
linearity with the curvature level. In this case, the
shallow-arch beam model is used since the nonlinear-
ity coming from the electrostatic load is small. It can
be seen from Fig. 11 that in this case S is positive for
very small range of initial curvature level (b
o
<1 nm),
indicating a hardening behavior. This means that for
CNT with large aspect ratio, a tiny slack level will
soften the fundamental mode. To verify the results
of Fig. 11, we integrate in time the differential equa-
tions of motion to obtain the dynamic response of the
slacked CNT under small DC and AC harmonic load.
Parts (a) and (b) of Fig. 12 show the response of 0.5
and 1.5 nm slacked CNTs, respectively, which verify
the predicted softening and hardening behavior based
on the perturbation results.
The variation of the effective nonlinearity with the
DC load for the unslaked CNT case is shown in
Fig. 13. In this case, the beam model applies up to
V
DC
< 1 V, after which the string model is used. We
Fig. 14 Variation of the effective nonlinearity coefcient S of the 100 nm slacked CNT with the DC voltage while using (a) a beam
model, (b) a cable model
can see from parts (a) and (b) of Fig. 13 that in this
case S is only positive in a very small range of DC
load, indicating a hardening behavior. The results of
the beam model are compared to those of the string
model, in which we can see that the CNT behavior is
of softening type. Also, the results are veried by time
integration of the equation of motion using the ROM,
Fig. 13(c) and (d).
Finally, the cases in Fig. 13 are simulated to predict
the effective nonlinearity against the DC load for a 100
nm slacked CNT in Fig. 14. Here also we notice that
the beam model applies up to V
DC
< 4 V. Above this
value, the cable model is used. One can see also that
the same behavior is obtained for the case of CNT with
higher radius, Fig. 9. In this case, the CNT is locally
dominated by a softening behavior due to the pres-
ence of the large quadratic nonlinearity from the slack
level and also from the electrostatic force (note that
a slacked CNT gets closer to the lower electrode am-
plifying the quadratic effect of the electrostatic force).
We also notice an increase in the effective nonlinear-
ity, which is due to the presence of a source of cu-
bic nonlinearity coming from the mid-plane stretching
of the CNT. Finally, the effective nonlinearity starts to
decrease near the pull-in zone where the electrostatic
force starts to dominate the behavior of the slacked
CNT.
7 Conclusions
In this paper, an investigation into the dynamic behav-
ior of an electrically actuated slacked single-walled
CNT when actuated by a DC force and an AC har-
monic load was presented. The natural frequencies of
the CNTs have been calculated numerically for var-
ious values of DC voltages and slack levels using a
reduced-order model obtained through a Galerkin dis-
cretization procedure. We have shown possible scenar-
ios of modes crossings and mode veering offering the
possibilities of energy transfers between modes as well
as possibilities of internal resonances. Then, a pertur-
bation method was used to study the dynamic behavior
of the CNT. Analytical expressions were derived using
a perturbation technique and validated by using inte-
gration of the ROM differential equations. The results
indicate that, to be used as linear resonators, CNTs
with high aspect ratio should be designed with an op-
timized radius and low slack level at low DC and AC
loads. Further, the obtained results show that the dy-
namic response of slacked CNTs is of softening type
even for small DC and AC values, as revealed through
the frequency-response curves and the variation of the
effective nonlinearity of the fundamental mode.
An important conclusion of this study is that slack
in CNTs introduces new possibilities of mode cross-
ing and mode veering, which may not exist in straight
unslacked CNTs [12]. To investigate the possibilities
of energy transfer among these modes, a perturbation
analysis based on two modes needs to be conducted
by modifying the expansion of (24) to be composed of
two modes instead of one. Also, slack makes the soft-
ening effect in the dynamics dominate any hardening
effect from mid-plane stretching making the possibil-
ity of hardening-type resonance of slacked CNTs very
hard (this is contrary to the case of straight CNTs of
dominant hardening behavior [12]). The understand-
ing of the effect of the various CNTs parameters on
their vibrational behavior can be helpful to utilize
those nanostructures as sensors and resonators of dis-
tinguished characteristics despite their inherent non-
linear behavior.
Acknowledgements The authors would like to thank the Na-
tional Science Foundation, which supported this work through
Grant No. 0928494, and Prof. Paul L. McEuen and Dr. Arend
van der Zande of Cornell University for their useful discus-
sions.
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1 23

R = 5 nm, d = 200 nm, Young modulus E = 1 TPa,

denotes the derivative of A with respect to

R = 5 nm, d = 200 nm, E = 1 TPa, and = 1.3

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