Single-walled carbon nanotube growth from ion implanted Fe catalyst

The authors present experimental evidence that single-walled carbon nanotubes can be grown by chemical vapor deposition from ion implanted iron catalyst. They systematically characterize the effect of ion implantation dose and energy on the catalyst nanoparticles and nanotubes formed at 900°C. They also fabricate a micromachined silicon grid for direct transmission electron microscopy characterization of the as-grown nanotubes. This work opens up the possibility of controlling the origin of single-walled nanotubes at the nanometer scale and of integrating them into nonplanar three-dimensional device structures with precise dose control.