Mechanism Responsible for Initiating Carbon Nanotube Vacuum Breakdown
- 11 August 2004
- journal article
- research article
- Published by American Physical Society (APS) in Physical Review Letters
- Vol. 93 (7), 075501
- https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevlett.93.075501
Abstract
We report a physical mechanism responsible for initiating a vacuum breakdown process of a single carbon nanotube (CNT) during field emission. A quasidynamic method has been developed to simulate the breakdown process and calculate the critical field, critical emission current density and critical temperature beyond which thermal runaway occurs before the CNT temperature reaches its melting point. This model is in good agreement with experiments carried out with a single CNT on a silicon microtip.Keywords
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