Excellent field emission properties from carbon nanotube field emitters fabricated using a filtration-taping method

Abstract

Abstract A filtration-taping method was demonstrated to fabricate carbon nanotube (CNT) emitters. This method shows many good features, including high mechanical adhesion, good electrical contact, low temperature, organic-free, low cost, large size, and suitability for various CNT materials and substrates. These good features promise an advanced field emission performance with a turn-on field of 0.88 V/mm at a current density of 0.1 mA/cm 2 , a threshold field of 1.98 V/mm at a current density of 1 mA/cm 2 , and a good stability of over 20 h. The filtration-taping technique is an effective way to realize low-cost, large-size, and high-performance CNT emitters. Key words: field emission properties, carbon nanotube, filtration-taping method 1. Introduction Due to their unique geometry and physical properties, carbon nanotubes (CNTs) are currently being investigated as next-generation field emitter materials for cold cathodes. Numerous papers can be found on field emission applications such as field emission displays, lamps, X-ray sources, high-resolution electron-beam instruments, and microwave amplifiers [1-5]. Up to now, various techniques have been developed for fabricating CNT field emitters using as-grown, spraying, electrophoresis, screen-printing, and attaching individual CNTs on tungsten probe methods, etc. [6-10]. However, these techniques suffer from weak me-chanical adhesion between CNT emitters and the cathode, or severe degradation of CNT emitters due to the organic binders used in the process, which lead to a short lifetime. There-fore, an efficient and organic binder-free technique for fabricating CNT emitters is still a great challenge. In this letter, we demonstrate an advanced organic-free technique named the filtration-taping method. The filtration-taping method is suitable to fabricate simple, large, and cost-effective CNT emitters that can ensure a high mechanical adhesion, good electri-cal contact, and damage-free CNT tips, resulting in enhanced field emission properties and excellent stability.