A structural mechanics model is employed for the investigation of the bending buckling behavior of perfect and defective single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs). The effects of different types of defects (vacancies and Stone–Wales defects) at various locations on the critical bending buckling moments and curvatures are also studied for zigzag and armchair nanotubes with various aspect ratios (length/diameter). The locations of defects are along the length of the nanotube and around the circumference. Moreover, the results of this structural mechanicsmodel are compared with a finite elementmodel. The simple continuum model, especially, could be adopted to predict the critical buckling moments and curvatures of SWCNTs with large aspect ratio. Finally, the results of the present structural model are compared with those from molecular dynamics (MD) simulation, and there is good agreement between our model and the MD model.

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