Impact of carbon nanotube length on electron transport in aligned carbon nanotube networks
Here, we quantify the electron transport properties of aligned carbon nanotube (CNT) networks as a function of the CNT length, where the electrical conductivities may be tuned by up to 10× with anisotropies exceeding 40%. Testing at elevated temperatures demonstrates that the aligned CNT networks ha...
| Main Authors: | , , , , , , |
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| Other Authors: | |
| Format: | Article |
| Language: | en_US |
| Published: |
American Institute of Physics (AIP)
2015
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| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/96369 https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3229-7315 https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3530-5819 https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1268-4492 https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4735-2153 |
| Summary: | Here, we quantify the electron transport properties of aligned carbon nanotube (CNT) networks as a function of the CNT length, where the electrical conductivities may be tuned by up to 10× with anisotropies exceeding 40%. Testing at elevated temperatures demonstrates that the aligned CNT networks have a negative temperature coefficient of resistance, and application of the fluctuation induced tunneling model leads to an activation energy of ≈14 meV for electron tunneling at the CNT-CNT junctions. Since the tunneling activation energy is shown to be independent of both CNT length and orientation, the variation in electron transport is attributed to the number of CNT-CNT junctions an electron must tunnel through during its percolated path, which is proportional to the morphology of the aligned CNT network. |
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