Improvement of field emission from printed carbon nanotubes by a critical bias field

Abstract

By applying a critical bias field instead of conventional surface treatments, the electron emission properties of screen-printed nanotubes were investigated through scanning electron. microscopy and emission current-voltage characteristics. After the surface treatment, at the bias field of 2.5 V/mu m, the electron emission current density with good uniform emission sites reached the value of 2.13 mA/cm(2) which was 400 times higher than that of the untreated sample, and the turn-on voltage decreased markedly from 700 to 460 V. In addition, the enhancement of the alignment of carbon nanotubes to the vertical direction was observed, resulting in an increase. in-the field-enhancement factor. (c) 2005 American Institute of Physics.