Publications Details
The potential of vacuum microelectronics for space reactor applications
This report discusses matrixed field emission devices which have been fabricated using a modification of standard integrated circuit fabrication techniques. The emitter-to-gate spacing is fixed by the thickness of a deposited oxide and not by photolithographic techniques. Functioning triodes have been fabricated using this deposited oxide spacer approach. Measured emission current to a collector electrically and physically separated from the matrixed emission array follows Fowler-Nordheim behavior. Modeling of the potential field near the emitter and gate structures as well as the emitted electron trajectories with a two-dimensional, Poisson solver, finite-difference code was used to evaluate and improve field emission structures.