Ab initio study of MoS2 nanotube bundles -: art. no. 045423

Recently, the synthesis of a new phase of MoS2I1/3 stoichiometry was reported [M. Remskar, A. Mrzel, Z. Skraba, A. Jesih, M. Ceh, J. Demsar, P. Stadelmann, F. Levy, and D. Mihailovic, Science 292, 479 (2001)]. Electron microscope images and diffraction data were interpreted to indicate bundles of sub-nanometer-diameter single-wall MoS2 nanotubes. After experimental characterization, the structure was attributed to an assembly of armchair'' nanotubes with interstitial iodine. Using first-principles total-energy calculations, bundles of MoS2 nanotubes with different topologies and stoichiometries are investigated. All of the systems are strongly metallic. Configurations with zigzag'' structures are found to be more stable energetically than the armchair'' ones, though all of the structures have similar stabilities. After relaxation, there remain several candidates which give a lattice parameter in relative agreement with experiment. Further, spin-polarized calculations indicate that a structure with armchair tubes iodine atoms in their center acquires a very large spontaneous magnetic moment of 12 mu(B), while the other structures are nonmagnetic. Our ab initio calculations show that in most of the other structures, the tubes are very strongly bound together, and that the compounds should be considered as a crystal, rather than as a bundle of tubes in the habitual sense.