Characteristics of a cold cathode electron source combined with secondary electron emission in a FED

In this paper, an insulator plate with holes is placed in front of a cold cathode. When the primary electrons hit the surface of the insulator tunnels, secondary electrons are generated. In this paper, the characteristics of the secondary electrons emitted from the gate structure are studied. Because the energies of the secondary electrons are smaller than that of the primary electron, the driving voltage for the current modulation is decreased by the introduction of the insulator tunnels, resulting in an improved energy uniformity of the electron beam. Triode structures with inclined insulator tunnels and with double insulator plates are also fabricated and lead to further improvements in the energy uniformity. The improved energy uniformity predicted by the simulation calculations is demonstrated by the improved brightness uniformity in the screen display images.