ABSTRACT
The growth behaviour of carbon nanotubes on the Fe-deposited Si (001) substrates is investigated by TEM and SEM. SEM results show that the growth characteristics of carbon nanotubes strongly depend on the Fe film deposition time. TEM results show that the CVD growth at 800°C causes the continuous Fe films to be broken up into nanoparticles 10–50nm across and discontinuous islands 110 nm–3.0 μm in size. It is shown that the Fe nanoparticles are necessary for the formation of aligned carbon nanotubes.
