Bond-breaking bifurcation states in carbon nanotube fracture

A brittle bond-breaking carbon nanotube (CNT) failure mechanism, which generally competes with the extensively discussed Stone-Wales bond rotation dislocation path is presented. Remarkably, the proposed failure path dominates at low temperatures, and is more probable to take place in a tensile-test experiment. Thus, the failure mechanism involves a series of shallowenergy minima in the highly strained CNT lattice which can be associated with broken-bond states.