Conductance of a photochromic molecular switch with graphene leads

Motta, Carlo; Trioni, M. I.; Brivio, Gian Paolo; Sebastian, K. L.

doi:10.1103/physrevb.84.113408

Cited by 22 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 34 publications

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“…These molecules react on light irradiation by reversibly changing between two well‐defined states of different properties: a ring‐opened, nonconjugate “off”‐state and a ring‐closed, conjugate “on”‐state. Density‐functional‐based calculations and extensions by nonequilibrium Green's functions on short model structures indicate a switching ratio between the nonconducting off‐state and the conducting on‐state of approximately 100 . Multireference complete active space (CAS) augmented Hartree–Fock calculations on the central diaryl moiety have shown that light‐induced switching involves a complex sequence of electronic and structural relaxations, which exclude a simple thermal ring opening or closure .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Light‐Induced Switching of Tunable Single‐Molecule Junctions

et al. 2015

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A major goal of molecular electronics is the development and implementation of devices such as single‐molecular switches. Here, measurements are presented that show the controlled in situ switching of diarylethene molecules from their nonconductive to conductive state in contact to gold nanoelectrodes via controlled light irradiation. Both the conductance and the quantum yield for switching of these molecules are within a range making the molecules suitable for actual devices. The conductance of the molecular junctions in the opened and closed states is characterized and the molecular level E 0, which dominates the current transport in the closed state, and its level broadening Γ are identified. The obtained results show a clear light‐induced ring forming isomerization of the single‐molecule junctions. Electron withdrawing side‐groups lead to a reduction of conductance, but do not influence the efficiency of the switching mechanism. Quantum chemical calculations of the light‐induced switching processes correlate these observations with the fundamentally different low‐lying electronic states of the opened and closed forms and their comparably small modification by electron‐withdrawing substituents. This full characterization of a molecular switch operated in a molecular junction is an important step toward the development of real molecular electronics devices.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Light‐Induced Switching of Tunable Single‐Molecule Junctions

et al. 2015

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“…The theoretical investigation of such structures was started recently for all-carbon junctions [12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20] and junctions with different organic molecules. [21][22][23][24] In particular, one example is the experimental 6,7 and theoretical 6,14,[16][17][18] investigations of linear atomic carbon chains between single-layer graphene electrodes and the first experimental observation of the current through the molecular junction with few-layer electrodes. 25 The other advantage of graphene electrodes is that the molecular gating problem could be solved.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Edge state effects in junctions with graphene electrodes

et al. 2012

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We consider plane junctions with graphene electrodes, which are formed by a single-level system ("molecule") placed between the edges of two single-layer graphene half planes. We calculate the edge Green functions of the electrodes and the corresponding lead self-energies for the molecular levels in the cases of semi-infinite singlelayer electrodes with armchair and zigzag edges. We show two main effects: first, a peculiar energy-dependent level broadening, reflecting at low energies the linear energy dependence of the bulk density of states in graphene, and, second, the shift and splitting of the molecular level energy, especially pronounced in the case of the zigzag edges due to the influence of the edge states. These effects give rise to peculiar conductance features at finite bias and gate voltages.

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“…The possibility of such hybridization was also noted recently in a DFT calculation. 45 When the Dirac point passes through the level, the transmission is suppressed and the transistor is in the off state [see Fig. 4(b)] at αeV g = E LUMO ≈ 0.133t.…”

Section: Transistor Effectmentioning

confidence: 99%

Graphene nanogap for gate-tunable quantum-coherent single-molecule electronics

et al. 2011

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We present atomistic calculations of quantum coherent electron transport through fulleropyrrolidine terminated molecules bridging a graphene nanogap. We predict that three difficult problems in molecular electronics with single molecules can be solved by utilizing graphene contacts: (1) a back gate modulating the Fermi level in the graphene leads facilitates control of the device conductance in a transistor effect with high on-off current ratio; (2) the size mismatch between leads and molecule is avoided, in contrast to the traditional metal contacts; (3) as a consequence, distinct features in charge flow patterns throughout the device are directly detectable by scanning techniques. We show that moderate graphene edge disorder is unimportant for the transistor function.

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Conductance of a photochromic molecular switch with graphene leads

Cited by 22 publications

References 34 publications

Light‐Induced Switching of Tunable Single‐Molecule Junctions

Light‐Induced Switching of Tunable Single‐Molecule Junctions

Edge state effects in junctions with graphene electrodes

Graphene nanogap for gate-tunable quantum-coherent single-molecule electronics

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