Electronic structure and optical properties of boron doped single-wall carbon nanotubes

We present a study of the electronic structure and the optical properties of boron doped single walled carbon nanotubes which have been produced by a substitution reaction from nanotube templates. The morphology and crystal structure of the samples have been characterized by transmission electron microscopy and electron energy-loss spectroscopy. Clean boron doped SWCNT with an average boron content of 15 at% have been produced. The B1s and C1s core level spectra reveal that boron is in an sp(2) configuration and that the effective charge transfer is about 0.5 holes per boron to the C-derived states. The boron substitution also leads to new features in the optical absorption spectra which can be attributed to the appearance of an acceptor band about 0.1 eV above the top of the valence band of the SWCNT. These changes in the electronic structure and in the optical properties upon boron substitution are in good agreement with state of the art ab initio calculations.