Novel carbon nanomaterials for flexible electronic devices

The project aims to study the nanoscale mechanical and electrical properties of carbon based nanomaterials and devices. Specifically the research is focusing on novel horizontally highly aligned single-walled carbon nanotubes SWNT, as backbone materials for next generation of flexible electronic devices such as field effect transistor, flow batteries, super capacitors, and solar cells. The performance of the aligned CNTs will be compared to other commercially available carbon nanostructures such as randomly distributed SWNTs network and graphene membrane. Advanced atomic force microscopy electrical tools will be used to investigate the electronic transport in SWNTs as function of applied bias, tubes length and purity (defects levels). The purity and chirality of the nanotubes will be investigated by Raman spectroscopy. Furthermore, electrostatic and kelvin probe will be used to shed light on the effect of Schottky junction at CNT-metal contacts and charge trapping in nanotubes on their carrier mobility. Furthermore, we aim to model the probe-nanotubes electrical interaction in order to quantify and interpret the AFM data. Also both undergraduate and graduates students will have the opportunity to get introduced to state of the art research topics related to carbon nanomaterials and/or flexible electronics as well as to be trained in using the available techniques in surface charcaterisation and nanoscale electrical measurements.