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Hysteresis of pulsed characteristics of field emission from nanocarbon materials
Author(s) -
Arkhipov A. V.,
Mishin M. V.,
Parygin I. V.
Publication year - 2007
Publication title -
surface and interface analysis
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.52
H-Index - 90
eISSN - 1096-9918
pISSN - 0142-2421
DOI - 10.1002/sia.2479
Subject(s) - field electron emission , common emitter , voltage , electron , amplitude , electric field , hysteresis , materials science , atomic physics , analytical chemistry (journal) , chemistry , optoelectronics , condensed matter physics , optics , physics , chromatography , quantum mechanics
Characteristics of pulsed‐field electron emission from nanocarbon films were investigated in experiments with a wide (1.5–5 mm) quasiplanar test gap. Parameters of the applied voltage (amplitude, shape and duration of pulsed component and d.c. bias) were varied; the maximum peak voltage value amounted to 40–45 kV. Dynamic I – V plots measured in 10–100 µs pulses combined inherent features of field emission (linearity in Fowler–Nordheim (FN) coordinates) with strong hysteresis. For the explanation of the latter, a model of emission via intermediate electron energy states is proposed. The simple quantitative model excellently agrees with the measured characteristics for different emitter samples and over a broad range of voltage parameters, but fails to simulate the phenomenon of emission efficiency boosting by fast voltage drops, also observed in the experiment. A possible mechanism of this dynamic effect may consist in the redistribution of electrons among the different field focuses at the nonuniform emitter surface under the effect of a strong nonstationary electric field. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.