Carbon-nanotube-based nanoelectromechanical switch

A nanoelectromechanical (NEM) switching device based on carbon nanotube (CNT) was investigated using atomistic simulations. The model schematics for a CNT-based three-terminal NEM switching device fabrication were presented. For the CNT-based three-terminal NEM switch, the interactions between the CNT-lever and the drain electrode or the substrate were very important. When the electrostatic force applied to the CNT-lever was the critical point, the CNT-lever was rapidly bent because of the attractive force between the CNT-lever and the drain; then, the total potential energy of the CNT-lever was rapidly increased and the interatomic potential energy of the CNT-copper was rapidly decreased. The energy curves for the pull-in and the pull-out processes showed the hysteresis loop that was induced by the adhesion of the CNT on the copper, which was the interatomic interaction between the CNT and the copper. The pull-in process could be divided with three regions such as non-contacting mode, short-range non-contact mode, and full-contacting mode. The pull-out process was also divided with three regions such as full-contacting mode, edge-contacting mode, and non-contacting mode. The short-range non-contacting or the edge-contacting modes were temporary and changed to the contacting mode or the non-contacting mode because of the interatomic interaction between the CNT-lever and the drain.