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Local probing of the field emission stability of vertically aligned multi-walled carbon nanotubes

Metallic cantilever in high vacuum atomic force microscope has been used as anode for field emission experiments from densely packed vertically aligned multi-walled carbon nanotubes. The high spatial resolution provided by the scanning probe technique allowed precise setting of the tip-sample distan...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Carbon (New York) 2009-04, Vol.47 (4), p.1074-1080
Main Authors: Giubileo, F., Bartolomeo, A. Di, Scarfato, A., Iemmo, L., Bobba, F., Passacantando, M., Santucci, S., Cucolo, A.M.
Format: Article
Language:English
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Summary:Metallic cantilever in high vacuum atomic force microscope has been used as anode for field emission experiments from densely packed vertically aligned multi-walled carbon nanotubes. The high spatial resolution provided by the scanning probe technique allowed precise setting of the tip-sample distance in the submicron region. The dimension of the probe (curvature radius below 50 nm) allowed to measure current contribution from sample areas smaller than 1 μm 2. The study of long-term stability evidenced that on these small areas the field emission current remains stable (within 10% fluctuations) several hours (at least up to 72 h) at current intensities between 10 −5 and 10 −8 A. Improvement of the current stability has been observed after performing long-time conditioning process to remove possible adsorbates on the nanotubes.
ISSN:0008-6223
1873-3891
DOI:10.1016/j.carbon.2008.12.035