Separated metallic and semiconducting single-walled carbon nanotubes: opportunities in transparent electrodes and beyond

Ever since the discovery of single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs), there have been many reports and predictions on their superior properties for use in a wide variety of potential applications. However, an SWNT is either metallic or semiconducting; these properties are distinctively different in electrical conductivity and many other aspects. The available bulk-production methods generally yield mixtures of metallic and semiconducting SWNTs, despite continuing efforts in metallicity-selective nanotube growth. Presented here are significant advances and major achievements in the development of postproduction separation methods, which are now capable of harvesting separated metallic and semiconducting SWNTs from different production sources with sufficiently high enrichment and quantities for satisfying at least the needs in research and technological explorations. Opportunities and some available examples for the use of metallic SWNTs in transparent electrodes and semiconducting SWNTs in various device nanotechnologies are highlighted and discussed.