Low cost fabrication of thin film carbon nanotubes with various transparencies

Abstract

Carbon nanotube was known for years to possess extraordinary properties, one of them is its high mobility and current carrying capability. Hence the most direct application that could make use this property would be electrodes. The main advantages of making use of carbon nanotube as electrodes are: low material cost due to abundant raw materials, solution process able, and could be used for application requiring transparencies. However, despite its simple procedure, there are many fabrication parameters that require thorough investigation, starting from selection of raw materials, solubilization methods, and deposition methods. In addition to that there are post fabrication steps that need to be carried out to obtain desirable properties of electrodes. Herein, we report fabrication method of carbon nanotube electrodes using air-gun spraying. Fabrication parameters and post fabrication steps were investigated to obtain high conductivity electrodes. Electrodes with different range of transparencies was fabricated starting from 85% transmittance at 550 nm, which could be used as replacement of common transparent electrodes (i.e ITO), up to totally opaque films, which can be used as interconnects. Copyright © 2010 by ASME.