W(310) cold-field emission characteristics reflecting the vacuum states of an extreme high vacuum electron gun.

An extremely high vacuum cold-field electron emission (CFE) gun operating at pressures ranging from ~10(-8) Pa to ~10(-10) Pa was constructed. Only the CFE current emitting from W(310) surfaces revealed the existence of a "stable region" with high current angular density just after tip flash heating. In the "stable region," the CFE current was damped very slowly. The presence of non-hydrogen gas eliminated this region from the plot. Improvement of the vacuum prolonged the 90% damping time of the CFE current from ~10 min to 800 min. The current angular density I' of CFE current was 60 and 250 µA/sr in the "stable region" for total CFE currents of 10 and 50 µA, respectively. These results were about three times larger than I' when measured after the complete damping of the CFE current. The CFE gun generated bright scanning transmission electron microscopy images of a carbon nanotube at 30 kV.

BCx layers with honeycomb lattices on an NbB2(0001) surface.

At elevated temperatures of 1000-1500 K, carbon (C) atoms that segregated to a surface and mixed with the boron (B) honeycomb lattice resulted in the formation of three different BC(x) layers as the topmost layers of NbB(2)(0001). Two of the layers were commensurate lattices: √7 × âˆš7 and √3 × âˆš3 structures; the third was incommensurate. The characteristic features of the √3 × âˆš3 lattice with a honeycomb structure are discussed on the basis of the experimental data.

Energy distributions of field emitted electrons from a multi-wall carbon nanotube.

Field emission energy distributions of electrons from one of the six pentagons located at the end of a multi-wall carbon nanotube have been measured by means of a high-resolution cylindrical energy analyzer. In a clean pentagon, the sub-peak was obtained at about 500 meV below the main peak, exhibiting a shift with increasing applied voltage. For electrons emitted from an adsorbate onto the pentagon, no fine structure was observed in the spectra. The broadening of the leading edge was also observed for both clean and adsorbed pentagon, indicating the field penetration into the nanotube due to its semimetallic nature. The full-width at half-maximum was 280 meV at the applied voltage of 660 V and increased linearly with applied voltage.