Role of hybridization on the Schottky barrier height of carbon nanotube field effect transistors

Abstract

The impact of hybridization on the Schottky barrier height (SBH) for holes at a metal/nanotube contact is investigated using ab initio density-functional theory. For small diameters, the impact of hybridization is a deviation of the SBH in comparison to that calculated using the ``$1/d$'' rule, where $d$ is the diameter of the carbon nanotube (CNT). In the hybridization region, the SBH reduces with chiral angle, suggesting that CNTs in this region may well be suited to microelectronic applications due to small SBH and large band gaps. Hybridization also causes a difference between the effective mass of electrons and holes, supposed to be identical within the tight-binding approximation. A strongly patterned behavior of the effective mass dependent on chirality and diameter is also reported here.