Electric-Field-Induced Connectivity Switching in Single-Molecule Junctions

Chun Tang; Jueting Zheng; Yiling Ye; Junyang Liu; Lijue Chen; Zhewei Yan; Zhixin Chen; Lichuan Chen; Xiaoyan Huang; Jie Bai; Zhaobin Chen; Jia Shi; Haiping Xia; Wenjing Hong

doi:10.1016/j.isci.2019.100770

Electric-Field-Induced Connectivity Switching in Single-Molecule Junctions

iScience. 2020 Jan 24;23(1):100770. doi: 10.1016/j.isci.2019.100770. Epub 2019 Dec 14.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ State Key Laboratory of Physical Chemistry of Solid Surfaces, College of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Collaborative Innovation Center of Chemistry for Energy Materials, Xiamen University, 361005 Xiamen, China.
² State Key Laboratory of Physical Chemistry of Solid Surfaces, College of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Collaborative Innovation Center of Chemistry for Energy Materials, Xiamen University, 361005 Xiamen, China. Electronic address: hpxia@xmu.edu.cn.
³ State Key Laboratory of Physical Chemistry of Solid Surfaces, College of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Collaborative Innovation Center of Chemistry for Energy Materials, Xiamen University, 361005 Xiamen, China. Electronic address: whong@xmu.edu.cn.

Abstract

The manipulation of molecule-electrode interaction is essential for the fabrication of molecular devices and determines the connectivity from electrodes to molecular components. Although the connectivity of molecular devices could be controlled by molecular design to place anchor groups in different positions of molecule backbones, the reversible switching of such connectivities remains challenging. Here, we develop an electric-field-induced strategy to switch the connectivity of single-molecule junctions reversibly, leading to the manipulation of different connectivities in the same molecular backbone. Our results offer a new concept of single-molecule manipulation and provide a feasible strategy to regulate molecule-electrode interaction.

Keywords: Electronic Materials; Molecular Electrochemistry; Quantum Electronics.