Carbon nanotubes films: Electronic properties and their application as field emitters

Aligned carbon nanotube films have been studied with a wide variety of characterization techniques. Although nanotubes resemble bulk graphite as far as carrier densities, susceptibilities and conductivities are concerned, transport properties and ESR measurments indicate that carrier localization occurs at low temperatures. Nanotube films are good field emitters producing large currents at relatively low electric fields. The performance is superior to the intensely studied CVD diamond films in particular for the threshold field for electron emission. We believe that the observed remarkable electron emission is related to the special electronic structure of the nanotube tips.