Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer formalism of superconductivity in carbon nanotubes

Abstract

We develop the Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer (BCS) formalism for the superconductivity of carbon nanotubes. It is found that the superconducting transition temperature Tc of single-wall carbon nanotubes decreases exponentially with the increase of the tube diameter because the density of states near the Fermi energy is inversely proportional to the tube diameter. For the multi-wall carbon nanotubes, the Cooper paring hopping between layers enhances the superconducting correlation and increases the superconducting transition temperature, which is consistent with the experimental observation.