title: Carbon Nanotube Thin-Film Antennas.
abstract: Multiwalled carbon nanotube (MWCNT) and single-walled carbon nanotube (SWCNT) dipole antennas have been successfully designed, fabricated, and tested. Antennas of varying lengths were fabricated using flexible bulk MWCNT sheet material and evaluated to confirm the validity of a full-wave antenna design equation. The ∼20× improvement in electrical conductivity provided by chemically doped SWCNT thin films over MWCNT sheets presents an opportunity for the fabrication of thin-film antennas, leading to potentially simplified system integration and optical transparency. The resonance characteristics of a fabricated chlorosulfonic acid-doped SWCNT thin-film antenna demonstrate the feasibility of the technology and indicate that when the sheet resistance of the thin film is >40 ohm/sq no power is absorbed by the antenna and that a sheet resistance of <10 ohm/sq is needed to achieve a 10 dB return loss in the unbalanced antenna. The dependence of the return loss performance on the SWCNT sheet resistance is consistent with unbalanced metal, metal oxide, and other CNT-based thin-film antennas, and it provides a framework for which other thin-film antennas can be designed.
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemical Engineering, Rochester Institute of Technology , Rochester, New York 14623, United States.|NanoPower Research Laboratories, Rochester Institute of Technology , Rochester, New York 14623, United States.
authors.forename: Ivan
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Puchades
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemical Engineering, Rochester Institute of Technology , Rochester, New York 14623, United States.|NanoPower Research Laboratories, Rochester Institute of Technology , Rochester, New York 14623, United States.
authors.forename: Jamie E
authors.initials: JE
authors.lastname: Rossi
authors.affiliation: Electronics Science and Technology Division, United States Naval Research Laboratory , Washington, District of Columbia 20375, United States.
authors.forename: Cory D
authors.initials: CD
authors.lastname: Cress
authors.affiliation: Electronics Science and Technology Division, United States Naval Research Laboratory , Washington, District of Columbia 20375, United States.
authors.forename: Eric
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Naglich
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemical Engineering, Rochester Institute of Technology , Rochester, New York 14623, United States.|NanoPower Research Laboratories, Rochester Institute of Technology , Rochester, New York 14623, United States.
authors.forename: Brian J
authors.initials: BJ
authors.lastname: Landi
keywords: conductivity of CNTs; multiwalled carbon nanotubes; single-walled carbon nanotubes; thin-film antennas; transparent antennas