Abstract
The effect of post-treatment process on electron field emission properties of the chemical vapor deposited diamond films, which were incorporated with boron-species, was examined. The SIMS profile and IR spectroscopy reveal that the solubility limit of boron species in diamond materials is around (B 3+ ) = 5 × 10 21 cm -3 , whereas the concentration of boron-species, which can be incorporated as substitutional dopants in diamond lattice is one tenth of solubility limit, i.e., (B 3+ ) = 5 × 10 20 cm -3 . The electron field emission properties of the as-deposited diamond films vary with the boron-content significantly. Moreover, post-annealing in vacuum alters the electron field emission properties of the films mainly via the rearrangement of the defects. Therefore, the electron emission capacity of lightly boron-doped diamonds is markedly suppressed and that of the heavily boron-doped diamonds is insignificantly modified due to post-annealing process.