title: Oxygen and light sensitive field-effect transistors based on ZnO nanoparticles attached to individual double-walled carbon nanotubes.
abstract: The attachment of semiconducting nanoparticles to carbon nanotubes is one of the most challenging subjects in nanotechnology. Successful high coverage attachment and control over the charge transfer mechanism and photo-current generation open a wide field of new applications such as highly effective solar cells and fibre-enhanced polymers. In this work we study the charge transfer in individual double-walled carbon nanotubes highly covered with uniform ZnO nanoparticles. The synthetic colloidal procedure was chosen to avoid long-chained ligands at the nanoparticle-nanotube interface. The resulting composite material was used as conductive channel in a field-effect transistor device and the electrical photo-response was analysed under various conditions. By means of the transfer characteristics we could elucidate the mechanism of charge transfer from non-covalently attached semiconducting nanoparticles to carbon nanotubes. The role of positive charges remaining on the nanoparticles is discussed in terms of a gating effect.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Physical Chemistry, University of Hamburg, Grindelallee 117, 20146 Hamburg, Germany.
authors.forename: Alina
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Chanaewa
authors.forename: Beatriz H
authors.initials: BH
authors.lastname: Juárez
authors.forename: Horst
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Weller
authors.forename: Christian
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Klinke