Carbon nanotube turfs are collections of nanotubes in a turf or mat assembly with potential application as thermal switches, flat panel displays, hard drives, sensors, etc. The nano-topology of the turf necessarily relates to the turf properties; electrical, thermal, optical, etc. A simple method to quantitatively characterize the density, tortuosity and path connectedness of the turfs using secondary electron imaging was previously developed. The present work aims at developing the groundwork for a more realistic measure of tortuosity by using a deterministic approach to obtain the radii of semi-circular tubes as observed in projected images.

This paper presents the fabrication technology and initial characterization of electrolyte-gated field effect transistor (FET) arrays based on CVD grown graphene on copper. We show that the graphene FET (GFET), when immersed in electrolytes, exhibit a transconductance around 5 mS/mm. From preliminary pH sensing experiments, a pH sensitivity of 24 mV/pH has been demonstrated.

This contribution deals with Carbon Nanotubes Field Effect transistors (CNTFETs) based gas sensors fabricated using a completely new dynamic spray based technique (patented) for SWCNTs deposition. The extreme novelty is that our technique is compatible with large surfaces, flexible substrates and allows to fabricate high performances transistors exploiting the percolation effect of the SWCNTs networks achieved with extremely reproducible characteristics. Recently, we have been able to achieve extremely selective measurement of NO2, NH3 and CO using four CNTFETS fabricated using different metals as electrodes, exploiting the specific interaction between gas and metal/SWCNT junctions. In this way we have identify an electronic fingerprinting of the gas detected. The response time is evaluated at less than 30sec.

The advanced electrodes for detecting organophosphate pesticides were prepared by modification of the gold (Au) electrode with the reduced graphene oxide/ionic liquid (RGO/IL) nanohybrids. Due to the cationic and anionic parts, the ILs on RGO sheets provide the amount of functional groups for dispersion of hybrids and immobilization of organophosphorus hydrolase (OPH) enzymes. After the immobilization of OPH on the RGO/IL-modified Au electrodes, the modified electrodes represent faster electron transfer than that of Au electrode, resulting in high performance of biosensor with response time (~ 10 s) and sensitivity (4.56 nA μM−1). In addition, the OPH/RGO/IL-modified Au electrode displayed good stability and reproducibility.

Ambipolar top-gated field effect transistors (FETs) based on large area Cu catalyzed CVD-grown monolayer graphene interfaced to advanced dielectrics have been constructed and examined both for their material and electrical qualities. Interfacing of the graphene with novel insulators/substrates could be tailored for the particular application and provide for enhanced device functionality. In contrast to graphene FETs using SiO2-based top-gate dielectric, which show asymmetric electron/hole mobility (with larger hole mobility), and Dirac point shifted to positive levels, FETs constructed using advanced AlN show Dirac point almost near neutral levels and near symmetric electron/hole mobility. The DP is shifted likely due to compensation of the intrinsic p-type doping by n-type doping introduced by the AlN deposition and potentially via a contribution of polarization-induced carrier density. Finally, we demonstrate a top-gated graphene FET with the first observation of RF operation with GHz cut-off frequency based on large area CVD graphene.

Because of their superior electronic properties and bottom-up growth mode, Carbon Nanotubes (CNT) may offer a valid alternative for high aspect ratio vertical interconnects in future generations of microchips. For being successful, though, CNT based interconnects must reach sufficiently low values of resistance to become competitive with current W or Cu based technologies. This essentially means that CMOS compatible processes are needed to produce dense CNT shells of extremely high quality with almost ideal contacts. Moreover, their electrical properties must be preserved at every process step in the integration of CNT into vertical interconnect structures. In this work this latter aspect is analyzed by studying the changes in the electrical characteristics when encapsulating CNT into different oxides. Oxide encapsulation is often exploited to hold the CNT in place and to avoid snapping during a polishing step. On the other hand, oxide encapsulation can influence the properties of the grown CNT which are directly exposed to possibly harmful oxidative conditions. Two different deposition techniques and oxides were evaluated: Chemical Vapor Deposition (CVD) of SiO2 (reference) and Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD) of Al2O3 in less aggressive oxidizing conditions. The two processes were transferred to CNT interconnect test structures on 200mm wafers and electrically benchmarked. The CNT resistance was measured in function of the CNT length which allows the extraction and individual distinction of the resistive contributions of the CNT and the contacts. It is shown that the encapsulating SiO2 deposited by CVD degrades the resistance of CNT by altering their quality. Directions for future improvements have been identified and discussed.

Large scale fabrication of graphene over transparent flexible polymer, Polyethelyne tetrapthalate (PET), and its application in flexible field emission display is reported here. We used Cu foil (~160 mm x 60 mm) to grow graphene by thermal chemical vapor deposition process and transfer the graphene over a polymer using a straightforward hot press lamination technique. The fabrication method is facile as there is no rigorous chemical process involved and the process is also applicable towards the fabrication of large scale graphene over a wide range of transparent flexible substrates for foldable micro-electronics applications. Further, we demonstrate the application of graphene/PET polymer film as anode of transparent flexible field emission display device. The device shows low turn-on voltage ~ 1.75V/μm and high current density of ~ 65μA/cm2 with field enhancement factor (β) ~1000.

We studied the electronic transport properties of monolayer and bilayer graphene in top-gated geometries. Monolayer and bilayer graphene were epitaxially grown by thermal decomposition of SiC. The half-integer quantum Hall effect under the gated environment was observed in monolayer graphene devices. The mobility of the monolayer and bilayer graphene devices showed distinct characteristics as a function of carrier density, which reflect their electronic structures. Strong temperature dependence at the charge neutrality point was observed in bilayer graphene devices, suggesting band gap opening.

Carbon nanofibers were used as building blocks for two-dimensional photonic crystal slabs. Electron beam lithography and chemical vapor deposition were used to fabricate regular arrays and random patterns of nanofibers. The optical properties of the samples were investigated using a diffraction measurement setup, as well as reflection ellipsometry. We find that carbon nanofiber regularity has a strong effect on both diffractive and specular optical properties. This shows that ellipsometry can be a valuable tool to study properties of carbon nanofiber arrays. It also shows that carbon nanofibers provide an interesting candidate as building blocks for nanostructured optical components.

Field emission from as-grown carbon nanotube (CNTs) films often suffered from high threshold electric field, and low emission site density due to screening effects. These problems can be resolved by patterned growth of CNTs on lithographically prepared catalyst films. However, these approaches are expensive and not applicable for future emitting devices with large display areas. Here we show that as-grown CNTs films can have low emission threshold field and high emission density without using any lithography processes. We have reduced screening effects and work function of as-grown CNTs films and created the novel CNT matrices by addition of vapor- and/or liquid- phase deposition. Furthermore, these CNT matrices can continuous emit electrons for 40 hours without significant degradation. The fabrication of our CNT matrices is described as follows. First, CNT films were grown by plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition. These vertically-aligned multiwalled carbon nanotubes (VA-MWCNTs) are having typical length and diameter of 4 microns and 40 nm, respectively. Spacing between these CNTs is ~80 nm in average, leading to poor emission properties due to the screening effect. These as-grown samples were then subjected to the deposition of strontium titanate (SrTiO3) by pulsed-laser deposition to reduce both the work function and screening effect of CNTs. The emission properties of these coated samples can be further improved by fully filled the spaces between VA-MWCNTs by poly-methyl metha acrylate (PMMA). The field emission threshold electric field was decreased from 4.22 V/μm for as-grown VA-MWCNTs to 1.7 V/μm for SrTiO3 coated VA-MWCNTs. The addition filling with PMMA and mechanical polishing can further reduce the threshold to 0.78V/μm for the so called PMMA-STO-CNT matrices. Long term emission stability and emission site density were also enhanced.

In this paper, we introduce a novel reconfigurable graphene logic based on graphene p-n junctions. In this logic device, switching is accomplished by using co-planar split gates that modulate the properties that are unique to graphene, including ambipolar conduction, electrostatic doping, and angular dependent carrier reflection. In addition, the use of these control gates can dynamically change the operation of the device, leading to reconfigurable multi-functional logic. A device model is derived from carrier transmission probability across the p-n junction for allowing quantitative comparison to CMOS logic. Based on this model, we show that the proposed graphene logic has significant advantages over CMOS gate in terms of area, delay, power, and signal restoration. Furthermore, the device utilizes a large graphene sheet with minimal patterning, allowing feasible integration with CMOS circuits, for potential CMOS-graphene hybrid circuits.

In this work, we present progress towards devices fabrication using all semiconducting nanotubes as the starting material. Individual nanotubes are known to have intrinsic mobility of more than 10,000 cm2/V-s but using a network of nanotubes will decrease this mobility because of tube-tube screening effect and junction resistance. Here we are using solution-based deposition of purified 99% semiconducting single-walled nanotubes as the channel in field effect transistors. DC analysis of devices’ characterization shows a high mobility, more than 50 cm2/Vs, and good on/off ratio in the range of more than 103 and 104. A critical issue is the ink formulation and dependence of electronic properties on the nanotube density after deposition. In addition, the channel length also plays an important role in controlling both mobility and on/off ratio.

Here we describe a doping approach that enables selective and variable doping on graphene. The doping level reflected in the successive shift of the Raman G mode can be progressively changed by varying the coverage of molecular adsorption on graphene. We make use of lattice defects which serve as anchor groups for the non-covalent functionalization on graphene to enhance molecule adsorption on defective sites at the elevated processing temperatures and also orbital overlap between graphene and adsorbates (melamine). Low density of defects, which can be monitored by seeing the intensity ratio of the D to G mode in the Raman spectra, was generated by exposing graphene to short Ar plasma pulses, followed by dopant adsorption. The controllable creation of defects makes the precise doping on graphene feasible. Systematic characterizations by Raman scattering show that holes are transferred to graphene, with the doping level depending on the surface coverage of melamine. The charge transfer is also identified by the downshift of the charge neutrality point in the transfer characteristics.