Mechanical and Electrical Properties of Carbon Nanotube Templated Metal Microstructures

Our group has used vertically aligned carbon nanotubes as a patterned, three-dimensional microfabrication scaffold to create CNT composite materials through chemical vapor infiltration. This method, termed carbon nanotube templated microfabrication (CNT-M), is a novel approach for creating precise high-aspect-ratio microstructures. In the past, dielectrics (SiO₂ and SiN_x) and semiconductors (Si and a-C) were the materials deposited on the CNT framework. Production and characterization of metallic microstructures is in its infancy. This study presents electrical, mechanical and structural properties of metallic microstructures made using tungsten and molybdenum carbonyl precursors through the CNT-M process.