Stability of carbon nanotube cold cathode electron beam (C-beam) with vacuum brazing process

Abstract

A modularization of electronic parts in electrical devices is a key feature for system integration. Especially, x-ray tube fabrication process has been stayed in an obsolete manner due to the utilizing of classical thermionic x-ray sources. But cold cathode emitters such as carbon based materials with nanoscale dimension are expected to replace the conventional wired tungsten filaments due to their outstanding electrical and mechanical properties. To facilitate cold cathode emitter as an xray source, state of the arts bonding techniques are required. In this study, carbon nanotube grown Si wafers were successfully bonded to the metal carrier via vacuum brazing process and no electrical degradation of CNT (carbon nanotubes) emitters were observed after the process. Finally, we evaluated the stability of electron beam current density for device reliability. We expect that the cost-effective and facile technique could be applied for cold cathode based x-ray tube manufacturing process.