In this article, the authors report the fabrication and observation of electron-field emission from nanodiamond ridge structure array capped on micropatterned silicon pillars. The fabrication process began with a deposition of 1.5-μm-thick ridge-structured diamond on a highly conductive n-type silicon substrate using microwave-plasma-enhanced-chemical-vapor deposition followed by patterning and reactive-ion etching techniques to get the device structure, which is an array of 50×50 silicon pillars capped with ridge-structured nanodiamond. Scanning electron microscope image confirms the device structure. The electron-field emission, performed in vertical-diode configuration, demonstrated a low threshold turn-on field of 1.2 V/μm and a high emission current of 150 μA at the anode field of 5.5 V/μm. The emission behavior has been compared with that of planar film of identical nanodiamond morphology. A 6000 times increase in current density is observed and attributed to its better geometrical-enhancement factor.
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