Fabrication of volcano-type TiN field emitter arrays

A new volcano-type triode field emitter array has been fabricated on a glas s substrate using titanium nitride as the emitter material. It is based on the process development for the formation of uniform emitters over large ar eas using reactive ion etching and the sputtering method. In this study, th e effects of the ratio of volcano emitter size to gate hole size on the emi ssion characteristics were investigated with a fixed emitter-gate distance of 1.0 mu m and compared with computer simulation results using a finite el ement method. As the ratio of volcano emitter size to gate hole size decrea sed, especially from a ratio of around 0.5 to 0.4, the anode current signif icantly increased. This behavior may result from the increase in the maximu m electric field on a tip with a decrease in the ratio as is expected from computer simulation. (C) 2000 American Vacuum Society. [S0734-211X(00)03602 -7].