Microwave purification of large-area horizontally aligned arrays of single-walled carbon nanotubes.
Recent progress in the field of single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs) significantly enhances the potential for practical use of this remarkable class of material in advanced electronic and sensor devices. One of the most daunting challenges is in creating large-area, perfectly aligned arrays of purely semiconducting SWNTs (s-SWNTs). Here we introduce a simple, scalable, large-area scheme that achieves this goal through microwave irradiation of aligned SWNTs grown on quartz substrates. Microstrip dipole antennas of low work-function metals concentrate the microwaves and selectively couple them into only the metallic SWNTs (m-SWNTs). The result allows for complete removal of all m-SWNTs, as revealed through systematic experimental and computational studies of the process. As one demonstration of the effectiveness, implementing this method on large arrays consisting of ~20,000 SWNTs completely removes all of the m-SWNTs (~7,000) to yield a purity of s-SWNTs that corresponds, quantitatively, to at least to 99.9925% and likely significantly higher.
Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Frederick Seitz Materials Research Laboratory, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois 61801, USA.
Xu
X
Xie
Department of Electronic Engineering, Incheon National University, Incheon 406-772, Republic of Korea.
Sung Hun
SH
Jin
School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana 47907, USA.
Muhammad A
MA
Wahab
Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Frederick Seitz Materials Research Laboratory, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois 61801, USA.
Ahmad E
AE
Islam
Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, University of Miami, Coral Gables, Florida 33146, USA.
Chenxi
C
Zhang
Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Frederick Seitz Materials Research Laboratory, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois 61801, USA.
Frank
F
Du
Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Frederick Seitz Materials Research Laboratory, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois 61801, USA.
Eric
E
Seabron
Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois 61801, USA.
Tianjian
T
Lu
Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Frederick Seitz Materials Research Laboratory, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois 61801, USA.
Simon N
SN
Dunham
Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois 61801, USA.
Hou In
HI
Cheong
Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Frederick Seitz Materials Research Laboratory, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois 61801, USA.
Yen-Chu
YC
Tu
Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois 61801, USA.
Zhilin
Z
Guo
Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Frederick Seitz Materials Research Laboratory, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois 61801, USA.
Ha Uk
HU
Chung
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois 60208, USA.
Yuhang
Y
Li
Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Frederick Seitz Materials Research Laboratory, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois 61801, USA.
Yuhao
Y
Liu
Department of Electrical Engineering, Seoul National University, Seoul 151-600, Republic of Korea.
Jong-Ho
JH
Lee
Department of Engineering Mechanics and Soft Matter Research Center, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310027, China.
Jizhou
J
Song
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois 60208, USA.
Yonggang
Y
Huang
School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana 47907, USA.
Muhammad A
MA
Alam
Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Frederick Seitz Materials Research Laboratory, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois 61801, USA.
William L
WL
Wilson
Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Frederick Seitz Materials Research Laboratory, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois 61801, USA.
John A
JA
Rogers