Chemical vapor deposition (CVD) using ferrocene (Fe(C_5H_5)_2) and xylene (C_8H_(10)) is frequently employed to fabricate, and to investigate the growth mechanism of nanotubes on planar substrates. The growth of carbon nanotubes by this approach, as we observed, showed interesting self-organization behaviors at early growth stages, which is closely related to the ratio of catalyst over carbon in the depositing vapor and to the growth kinetics of CNTs. Investigation on the very early deposition stages of this CVD method demonstrated that, the self-organization of carbon nanotubes is determined by the way that the catalyst particles adhere to the substrate surface, and the growth kinetics following. By adjusting these factors at the early deposition stages, we successfully fabricated different microstructures of carbon nanotubes and continuous films of CNTs on flat silicon substrates. This provides ways to control the growth and self-organization of carbon nanotubes.
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