Silicon based devices are expected to achieve the limit of possible
downscaling in 10 to 15 years. Thus, the search of new materials to
construct smaller, faster and more energy efficient devices has been a
very active research area. Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) are very good
candidates to construct nanoelectronic and nanophotonic devices [1,2,3]
due to unique physical properties, such as its metallic or
semiconducting characteristics depending only its diameter and chirality
[4,5] and capability of caring high current densities (up to 1010A/cm2).
In this work we develop nanofabrication techniques of single-walled
carbon nanotubes (SWNTs) based devices using a combination of electron
beam and optical lithography with Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM). We used
both CVD-grown nanotubes [6] and HipCO-NTs [7] suspended on aqueous
solution and deposited on the substrate. Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM)
in tapping mode (Multimode Nanoscope IV, Digital Instruments) was used
to CVD sample characterization, study of CNT deposition and to localize
and index the nanotubes on substrate using lithography patterns as
references, making possible to selectively construct metallic contacts
on the CNTs.