Design and development of low-power driven hybrid electroluminescent lamp from carbon nanotube embedded phosphor material

Abstract We present a novel methodology to design a hybrid electroluminescent (EL) lamp by embedding carbon nanotubes (CNTs) inside the ZnS:Mn phosphor particles by conventional solid state diffusion technique. By doing so, the phosphor particles exhibited increase in EL brightness and efficiency at low operating voltages ( AC ). Interestingly, shorter the length of CNTs used, greater was the field enhancement effect and lower was the operating voltages to glow the EL lamps. The role of CNTs have been identified to form conductive paths inside the ZnS particle thereby triggering EL due to electron injection to luminescent centers (Mn 2+ ) at nominal voltages. In addition, a detailed electrical characterization of the novel EL lamp along with its spectral energy distribution studies are presented.