Electron stimulated desorption of FED phosphors

Field emission cathode arrays are sensitive to contamination by residual gases present in the vacuum envelope. One source of such gases in packaged field emission displays is the electron beam induced desorption of display phosphors. In this paper, we report measurements of electron stimulated desorption (ESD) of gaseous species from two blue powder phosphors, namely Y/sub 2/SiO/sub 5/:Ce and ZnS:Ag,Cl. The ESD measurements were made for beam energies from 100 to 5000 eV, with DC current densities of 10 to 200 /spl mu/A/cm/sup 2/. The gas species evolved from phosphor desorption were analyzed with a high resolution quadrupole mass spectrometer placed directly in line of sight of the excitation area.