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Updated: May 1, 2026

Electrochemical Etching and Characterization of Sharp Field Emission Points for Electron Impact Ionization
Published on: July 12, 2016
Determining the work function of a carbon-cone cold-field emitter by in situ electron holography
Ludvig de Knoop1, Florent Houdellier1, Christophe Gatel1
1CEMES-CNRS, Université de Toulouse, 29 rue Jeanne Marvig, 31055 Toulouse, France.
Abstract:
Cold-field emission properties of carbon cone nanotips (CCnTs) have been studied in situ in the transmission electron microscope (TEM). The current as a function of voltage, i(V), was measured and analyzed using the Fowler-Nordheim (F-N) equation. Off-axis electron holography was employed to map the electric field around the tip at the nanometer scale, and combined with finite element modeling, a quantitative value of the electric field has been obtained. For a tip-anode separation distance of 680 nm (measured with TEM) and a field emission onset voltage of 80 V, the local electric field was 2.55 V/nm. With this knowledge together with recorded i(V) curves, a work function of 4.8±0.3 eV for the CCnT was extracted using the F-N equation.
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