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Carbon Nanotube Bundle Array Cold Cathodes for THz Vacuum Tube Sources

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Abstract

We present high performance cold cathodes composed of arrays of carbon nanotube bundles that routinely produce > 15 A/cm2 at applied fields of 5 to 8 V/µm without any beam focusing. They have exhibited robust operation in poor vacuums of 10-6 to 10-4 Torr- a typically achievable range inside hermetically sealed microcavities. A new double-SOI process was developed to monolithically integrate a gate and additional beam tailoring electrodes. The ability to design the electrodes for specific requirements makes carbon nanotube field emission sources extremely flexible. The lifetime of these cathodes is found to be affected by two effects: a gradual decay of emission due to anode sputtering, and catastrophic failure because of dislodging of CNT bundles at high fields ( > 10 V/µm).

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Acknowledgments

This research was carried out at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under a contract with National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). This work was funded by JPL’s Research and Technology Development Fund and partly by Defense Advanced Research Project Agency. We thank Dr. Paula Grunthaner, Dr. Barbara Wilson, Dr. James Cutts, and Dr. Timothy Krabach for their advice on the cathode development as part of the internal research and development effort. We thank Dr. Mark Rosker of Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency for his support of this work. We thank Dr. Ken Dean of Motorola, Dr. John Hong of JPL (at the time of this work), and Dr. Dev Palmer of US Army Research Office for useful discussions.

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Author notes

  1. Michael J. Bronikowski

    Present address: Atomate Corporation, 2665-D Park Center Drive, Simi Valley, CA, USA

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA

    Harish M. Manohara, Risaku Toda, Robert H. Lin, Anna Liao, Michael J. Bronikowski & Peter H. Siegel

  2. Beckman Institute, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA

    Peter H. Siegel

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  1. Harish M. Manohara
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  2. Risaku Toda
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  3. Robert H. Lin
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  4. Anna Liao
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  5. Michael J. Bronikowski
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  6. Peter H. Siegel
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Correspondence to Harish M. Manohara.

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Manohara, H.M., Toda, R., Lin, R.H. et al. Carbon Nanotube Bundle Array Cold Cathodes for THz Vacuum Tube Sources. J Infrared Milli Terahz Waves 30, 1338–1350 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10762-009-9547-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10762-009-9547-x

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