Work Function Characterization of Potassium-Intercalated, Boron Nitride Doped Graphitic Petals

This paper reports on characterization techniques for electron emission from potassiumintercalated boron nitride-modified graphitic petals (GPs). Carbon-based materials offer potentially good performance in electron emission applications owing to high thermal stability and a wide range of nanostructures that increase emission current via field enhancement. Furthermore, potassium adsorption and intercalation of carbon-based nanoscale emitters decreases work functions from approximately 4.6 eV to as low as 2.0 eV. In this study, boron nitride modifications of GPs were performed. Hexagonal boron nitride is a planar structure akin to graphene and has demonstrated useful chemical and electrical properties when embedded in graphitic layers. Photoemission induced by simulated solar excitation was employed to characterize the emitter electron energy distributions, and changes in the electron emission characteristics with respect to temperature identified annealing temperature limits. After several heating cycles, a single stable emission peak with work function of 2.8 eV was present for the intercalated GP sample up to 1,000 K. Up to 600 K, the potassium-intercalated boron nitride modified sample exhibited improved retention of potassium in the form of multiple emission peaks (1.8, 2.5, and 3.3 eV) resulting in a large net electron emission relative to the unmodified graphitic sample. However, upon further heating to 1,000 K, the unmodified GP sample demonstrated better stability and higher emission current than the boron nitride modified sample. Both samples deintercalated above 1,000 K.