Fabrication of Carbon Nanotube Field Emitters

Abstract

This paper presents the fabrication and field emission of carbon nanotube field emitters for a micro mass spectrometer. The carbon nanotube is an adequate material as a field emitter since it has good characteristics. We have successfully fabricated a diode field emitter and a triode field emitter. Each field emitter has been constructed using several micromachining processes and a thermal CVD process. In the case of the diode field emitter, to increase the electric field, the carbon nanotubes are selectively grown on the patterned nickel catalyst layer. The electron current of the diode field emitter is 73.2 ${\mu}A$ when the anode voltage is 1100V. That of the triode field emitter is 3.4 pA when the anode voltage is 1000V.