Electrical Transport in Carbon Nanotube Y-junctions- a Paradigm for Novel Functionality at the Nanoscale

Carbon Nanotube (CNT) morphologies with a self-contained gate, such as Y-junctions, offer a new way of exploiting features unique to the nanoscale, such as quantum ballistic transport. The advantages of low power and high frequency operation can then be applied to the fabrication of novel devices. Several other novel functionalities in Y- CNTs, including rectification, switching, high-frequency performance, and logic gates have been experimentally verified1. Y-CNT geometry dependent current blocking behavior, as a function of annealing temperature has also been observed. In view of the above observations, we propose that Y-CNTs can be used as prototypical nanoelectronic components.