Influence of Temperature on the Conductivity of Multi-walled Carbon Nanotube Interconnects**Supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant Nos 61204044, 61376039 and 61334003, and the National Key Basic Research Program of China under Grant No 2014CB339900.

Abstract

We propose a new conductivity model of multi-walled carbon nanotube (MWCNT) interconnects considering the influence of temperature. For each shell of MWCNT interconnects, it may present the property of ballistic transport or may suffer from acoustic photo and optical phonon (OP) scattering depending on their mean free paths (MFPs) and the wire length. Furthermore, since the MFPs are proportional to the shell diameter, five regions exist in the wire length in which the factors influencing the conductivity are determined. Thus the conductivity is modeled in five cases according to their lengths, and the final obtained model is a 5-piecewise function. By using this model, the influence of temperature on the conductivity is examined and analyzed. It is shown that the conductivity demonstrates different, changing behaviors with the increase of temperature in the five cases. Additionally, the influence of OP scattering on the conductivity does not need to be taken into account at room temperatures, whereas this influence will produce a decline region in the conductivity at high temperatures.