Nanoparticle-density-dependent field emission of surface-decorated SiC nanowires

Abstract

Increasing the electron emission site density of nanostructured emitters with limited field screening effects is one of the key issues for improving the field emission (FE) properties. In this work, we reported the Au-nanoparticles-density-dependent field emission behaviors of surface-decorated SiC nanowires. The Au nanoparticles (AuNPs) decorated around the surface of the SiC nanowires were achieved via an ion sputtering technique, by which the densities of the isolated AuNPs could be adjusted by controlling the fixed sputtering times. The measured FE characteristics demonstrated that the turn-on fields of the SiC nanowires were tuned to be of 2.06, 1.14, and 3.35 V/μm with the increase of the decorated AuNPs densities, suggesting that a suitable decorated AuNPs density could render the SiC nanowires with totally excellent FE performances by increasing the emission sites and limiting the field screening effects.