Highly flexible and robust N-doped SiC nanoneedle field emitters

Flexible field emission (FE) emitters, whose unique advantages are lightweight and conformable, promise to enable a wide range of technologies, such as roll-up flexible FE displays, e-papers and flexible light-emitting diodes. In this work, we demonstrate for the first time highly flexible SiC field emitters with low turn-on fields and excellent emission stabilities. n-Type SiC nanoneedles with ultra-sharp tips and tailored N-doping levels were synthesized via a catalyst-assisted pyrolysis process on carbon fabrics by controlling the gas mixture and cooling rate. The turn-on field, threshold field and current emission fluctuation of SiC nanoneedle emitters with an N-doping level of 7.58 at.% are 1.11 V μm-1, 1.55 V μm-1 and 8.1%, respectively, suggesting the best overall performance for such flexible field emitters. Furthermore, characterization of the FE properties under repeated bending cycles and different bending states reveal that the SiC field emitters are mechanically and electrically robust with unprecedentedly high flexibility and stabilities. These findings underscore the importance of concurrent morphology and composition controls in nanomaterial synthesis and establish SiC nanoneedles as the most promising candidate for flexible FE applications. © 2015 Nature Publishing Group All rights reserved.