Effect of cubic phase evolution on field emission properties of boron nitride island films

Journal Article · Tue Dec 01 00:00:00 EST 2009 · Journal of Applied Physics

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1063/1.3261845· OSTI ID:21359377

Teii, Kungen; Yamao, Ryota ^[1]; Matsumoto, Seiichiro ^[2]

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1. Department of Applied Science for Electronics and Materials, Interdisciplinary Graduate School of Engineering Sciences, Kyushu University, Kasuga, Fukuoka 816-8580 (Japan)
2. Exploratory Materials Research Laboratory for Energy and Environment, National Institute for Materials Science, 1-2-1 Sengen, Tsukuba, Ibaraki 305-0047, Japan and Ceramic Forum Co. Ltd., 1-6-6 Taitoh, Taitoh-ku, Tokyo 110-0016 (Japan)

Field emission performance of boron nitride (BN) island films is studied in terms of cubic phase evolution in plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition. Fine-grained island films with large surface roughness can be grown for initial sp{sup 2}-bonded BN and subsequent cubic BN (cBN) phases by using low-energy (approx20 eV) ion bombardment. Ultraviolet photoelectron spectroscopy reveals that the electron affinity is as low as 0.3 eV for both sp{sup 2}-bonded BN and cBN phases. The evolution of cBN islands reduces the turn-on field down to around 9 V/mum and increases the current density up to 10{sup -4} A/cm{sup 2}. The emission is facilitated by the larger field enhancement due to the larger roughness and the higher conduction of cBN islands. The potential barrier height is estimated to be about 3.4 eV for emission from the Fermi level, while it is only about 0.3 eV for 'conduction band emission'.

• OSTI ID: 21359377
• Journal Information: Journal of Applied Physics, Vol. 106, Issue 11; Other Information: DOI: 10.1063/1.3261845; (c) 2009 American Institute of Physics; ISSN 0021-8979
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE
BORON NITRIDES
CHEMICAL VAPOR DEPOSITION
CRYSTAL GROWTH
CURRENT DENSITY
EV RANGE 10-100
FERMI LEVEL
FIELD EMISSION
ION BEAMS
PHOTOELECTRON SPECTROSCOPY
ROUGHNESS
SEMICONDUCTOR MATERIALS
THIN FILMS
ULTRAVIOLET RADIATION
BEAMS
BORON COMPOUNDS
CHEMICAL COATING
DEPOSITION
ELECTROMAGNETIC RADIATION
ELECTRON SPECTROSCOPY
EMISSION
ENERGY LEVELS
ENERGY RANGE
EV RANGE
FILMS
MATERIALS
NITRIDES
NITROGEN COMPOUNDS
PNICTIDES
RADIATIONS
SPECTROSCOPY
SURFACE COATING
SURFACE PROPERTIES