Macroscopic effects of tunneling barriers in nanotube bundles aggregates

TL;DR

This study investigates how tunneling barriers affect electrical transport in aligned single-walled carbon nanotube bundles, revealing two conduction regimes and modeling the system with a circuit of junctions.

Contribution

It provides a systematic analysis of transport properties in nanotube bundle aggregates and introduces a circuit model accounting for junction effects.

Findings

Identification of two conduction regimes in tunneling barriers

Development of a circuit model for bundle junctions

Experimental validation of transport behavior

Abstract

We report on experiments conducted on single walled carbon nanotube bundles aligned in chains and connected through a natural contact barrier. The dependence upon the temperature of the transport properties is investigated for samples having different characteristics. Starting from two bundles separated by one barrier deposited over four contact probes, we extend the study of the transport properties to samples formed by chains of several bundles. The systematic analysis of the properties of these aggregates shows the existence of two conduction regimes in the barrier. We show that an electrical circuit taking into account serial and parallel combinations of voltages generated at the junctions between bundles models the samples consistently.