GROWTH OF CARBON NANOTUBES BY HF-CVD METHOD USING SIMPLE ROUTE

In this study, fast growth of pure carbon nanotubes (CNTs) via hot filament chemical vapor deposition (HF-CVD) technique was investigated. The surface morphology of CNTs films grown on (100) single crystal silicon substrates using Hydrogen (H2) and Methane (CH4) gas mixture with flow rates of 100 and 3 sccm (standard cubic centimeter) respectively is reported. The CNTs films were characterized by Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX) techniques. It is shown that, due to high amount of the released carbon atoms, there was a formation of micro-crystalline graphite having size ~ 0.1 – 0.2 micrometer, but after covering the substrate surface by stainless steel mask having an array of ~1mm size holes, sufficiently large population of CNTs could be observed on the surface of the substrate with average diameter of ~200 nm. The formation of pure CNTs is confirmed by energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX) analysis which shows that the atomic percentage of carbon was about 87 % and the remaining percentage was due to silicon substrate