Fabrication of hundreds of field effect transistors on a single carbon nanotube for basic studies and molecular devices

High-throughput fabrication of carbon nanotube field effect transistors (CNTFETs) with uniform properties has been a challenge since they were first fabricated in 1998. Here, the authors report a novel fabrication method to produce a 1 x 1 cm(2) chip with over 700 CNTFETs fabricated around one single carbon nanotube (CNT). This large number of devices allows us to study the stability and uniformity of CNTFET properties. The authors grow flow-aligned CNTs on a SiO2/Si substrate by chemical vapor deposition and locate a single long CNT (as long as 1 cm) by scanning electron microscopy. Two photolithography steps are then used, first to pattern contacts and bonding pads, and next to define a mask to 'burn' away additional nanotubes by oxygen plasma etch. A fabrication yield of similar to 72% is achieved. The authors present statistics of the transport properties of these devices, which indicates that all the CNTFETs share the same threshold voltage, and similar on-state conductance. These devices are then used to measure DNA conductance by connecting DNA molecule of varying lengths to lithographically cut CNTFETs. (C) 2013 American Vacuum Society.