Donor doping of single-walled carbon nanotubes by filling of channels with silver

The channels of single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs) are filled with metallic silver. The synthesized nanocomposites are studied by Raman spectroscopy and optical absorption spectroscopy, and these data indicate a substantial modification of the electronic structure of the nanotubes upon their filling. Moreover, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy shows that the incorporation of the metal leads to a change in the work function of SWNTs due to the Fermi level upshift and to the transfer of an electron density from inserted nanoparticles to the nanotube walls. Thus, the filling of the channels with silver results in donor doping of the nanotubes.