•Field emission of high currents from CNT emitters usually enforces them to be exposed to high electrostatic forces and Joule heating. Furthermore, x-ray tubes using CNT emitters have been often brazed at high temperature for vacuum packaging.
•Under such circumstances, CNT emitters may be easily damaged, thus requiring highly crystalline and thermally stable CNTs.
•The electric arc discharge method has been known to produce highly crystalline CNTs, thanks to their high growth temperature of ~ 3000 °C.
•This study investigated the experimental parameters such as gas pressure and gas composition (N2/O2 ratio) to optimize the arc discharge synthesis condition.
•We synthesized CNTs having high crystallinity by arc discharge and prepared the CNT paste using them.
•Fabrication processes of CNT pastes are optimized, such as milling time of fillers and dispersion methods, for better field emission performance.