MICROMEGAS – Nanofluidics inside a single carbon nanotube

Taking benefit of the specific properties of fluids in nanoconfinement should allow to challenge the limits of macroscopic continuum frameworks, with the ultimate aim of reaching the efficiency of biological fluidic systems, such as aquaporins. Carbon nanotubes have a decisive role to play in this quest, as suggested by the anomalously large permeabilities of macroscopic carbon nanotube membranes recently measured. This behavior is still not understood, but may be the signature of a ‘superlubricating’ behavior of water in these nanostructures, associated with a vanishing friction below a critical diameter, a result put forward by our preliminary theoretical results.

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