A Memristive Model for Graphene Emitters: Hysteresis and Self‐Crossing

Hysteresis exhibited by current–voltage characteristics during field‐emission experiments is often considered undesirable in terms of practical applications. However, this is an appealing effect for the purposes of memristive devices. A two‐stage model to describe hysteretic characteristics is developed, with a particular focus on the system which includes a cathode made of a single‐layered graphene sheet on a substrate. In addition to hysteresis, the current–voltage curves also display an unusual self‐crossing behavior. The presented memristive model can be used for quantitative description of different hysteretic characteristics such as abrupt changes and self‐crossings and for understanding and modeling the processes associated with field emission from plane graphene emitters.