Author ORCID Identifier
Date Available
7-11-2022
Year of Publication
2022
Degree Name
Master of Materials Science and Engineering (MMatSE)
Document Type
Master's Thesis
College
Engineering
Department/School/Program
Chemical and Materials Engineering
First Advisor
Dr. Matthew Beck
Abstract
The exact surface configuration of scandate cathodes has been a point of contention for the materials community for a long time. Without proper understanding of it and the related structures and emission mechanisms, scandate cathodes remain patchy and unreliable emitters. Thus, density functional theory techniques were applied to various potential surface arrangements and found that there are several low-energy surfaces with low work functions that incorporate a scandium interlayer between tungsten and oxygen or otherwise have a scandium-on-tungsten structure. Furthermore, it was discovered that adding a monolayer of scandium directly to a tungsten surface is surprisingly favorable, thermodynamically. While none of the test surfaces match the properties or compositions of real scandate cathode surfaces, they shine a light on the previously-unexplored phenomenon of this scandium monolayer effect which runs counter to commonly-understood metallurgical principles.
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
https://doi.org/10.13023/etd.2022.237
Funding Information
This work was financially supported by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Innovative Vacuum Electronics Science and Technology (INVEST) program, under grant number N66001-16-1-4041.
Recommended Citation
Miller-Murthy, Shankar, "A Computational Exploration of the Scandate Cathode Surface" (2022). Theses and Dissertations--Chemical and Materials Engineering. 141.
https://uknowledge.uky.edu/cme_etds/141
Included in
Electromagnetics and Photonics Commons, Electronic Devices and Semiconductor Manufacturing Commons, Mechanics of Materials Commons, Other Materials Science and Engineering Commons, Semiconductor and Optical Materials Commons
