title: High-field electrical transport in single-wall carbon nanotubes
abstract: Using low-resistance electrical contacts, we have measured the intrinsic high-field transport properties of metallic single-wall carbon nanotubes. Individual nanotubes appear to be able to carry currents with a density exceeding 10(9) A/cm(2). As the bias voltage is increased, the conductance drops dramatically due to scattering of electrons. We show that the current-voltage characteristics can be explained by considering optical or zone-boundary phonon emission as the dominant scattering mechanism at high field.
authors.affiliation: Department of Applied Physics and DIMES, Delft University of Technology, Lorentzweg 1, 2628 CJ Delft, The Netherlands.
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Yao
authors.initials: CL
authors.lastname: Kane
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Dekker