Carbon Nanotubes For Field Emission Displays

Display structures suitable for direct growth of CNT films by thermal CVD are described. The CNT film specifications for TV application are the following: a threshold field for emission higher than 3 V/μm, a current density of 140mA/cm2 and an emission site density around 107 cm−2. The major difficulty encountered with the deposited films is to reach the specified emission site density. These films present an exponential distribution of the amplification factor controlling the current emission. Small 1 cm2 working displays with CNTs grown by using the decomposition of C2H2 over Ni catalyst have been done. These samples show that the three major locks of conventional FED technology, namely large size compatibility, simple low cost cathode and good reliability, are now opening thanks to CNTs.