AVS 46th International Symposium
    Topical Conference on Emerging Opportunities and Issues in Nanotubes and Nanoelectronics Thursday Sessions
       Session NT+NS+EM+MS-ThM

Paper NT+NS+EM+MS-ThM9
The Structure of Nanotubes Observed with Thermal Field Emission

Thursday, October 28, 1999, 11:00 am, Room 6C

Session: Nanotubes: Nanoelectronics and Field Emission
Presenter: K.A. Dean, Motorola Flat Panel Display Division
Authors: K.A. Dean, Motorola Flat Panel Display Division
B.R. Chalamala, Motorola Flat Panel Display Division
O. Groening, University of Fribourg, Switzerland
O.M. Kuettel, University of Fribourg, Switzerland
Correspondent: Click to Email
We studied the structure of single-walled nanotubes (SWNTs) using field emission microscopy. The field emission images obtained after thermal cleaning depict the spatially-resolved electronic structure of the individual SWNT caps. Using high temperature field emission, we demonstrate how to distinguish between the patterns of individual SWNTs and those of clusters, how to alter the structure of the nanotube cap, and how to extract information about the SWNT structure and chirality from the field emission image. In addition, we demonstrate a technique for measuring the SWNT local density of states through thermal field emission energy distribution measurements. With this technique, we observe that nanotubes have discrete electronic states several eV above the Fermi level, and we suggest that these states are responsible for the large variation in emission current vs. temperature behavior observed among nanotubes.