Pulsed laser de-wetting of nickel catalyst for carbon nanofiber growth

Abstract

We present a pulsed laser dewetting technique that produces single nickel catalyst particles from lithographically patterned disks for subsequent carbon nanofiber growth through plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD). Unlike standard heat treated Ni catalyst disks where multiple nickel particles and consequently multiple carbon nanofibers (CNF) are observed, single vertically aligned CNFs could be obtained from the laser dewetted catalyst. Various nickel disk radii and thicknesses were attempted and the resultant number of carbon nanofibers was found to be a function of the initial disk dimension and the number of laser pulses.