Rapid fabrication of wafer scale patterned nickel nanocone arrays for field emission applications

The Ni NCs were formed on a large area of the substrate of a 4-inch wafer. The field emission measurement of the plain NCs and patterned NCs reveals that the turn-on field is for patterned NC arrays (3.23 V/μm) is lower than that for plain NCs (3.93 V/μm) while the field enhancement factor for patterned NC arrays (2963) is greater than for plain NCs (1139). Our approach to form patterned Ni NCs involves a simple, fast, cost-effective, and scalable method to fabricate effective field emitters. This approach is suitable for creating large-scale, patterned one-dimensional nanostructures for applications in flat-panel displays or electron sources.