Molecular electronics articles within Nature Communications

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  • Article
    | Open Access

    The efficiency of upconversion electroluminescence remains very low for single-molecule emitters. Here, the authors report over one order of magnitude improvement in the emission efficiency via engineering energy-level alignments for triplet relayed upconversion involving only carrier injection.

    • Yang Luo
    • , Fan-Fang Kong
    •  & Zhen-Chao Dong

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Metal-metal interfaces hold promise as contacting moieties for single-molecule devices with tunable functionality, yet the direct bonding has remained a challenge. Here, Lee et al. report the formation of Fe-Au bond without chemical ligand support in ferrocene-based molecular junctions.

    • Woojung Lee
    • , Liang Li
    •  & Latha Venkataraman

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Spin and charge dynamics are inevitably linked, the study of the one often illuminating the other. Here, the authors study spin relaxation in ambipolar polymers and, backed by simulations, show how charge dynamics and wavefunction localization together set relaxation times up to room temperature.

    • Remington L. Carey
    • , Samuele Giannini
    •  & Henning Sirringhaus

  • Article
    | Open Access

    A fundamental challenge for molecular electronics is the change in photophysical properties of molecules upon direct electrical contact. Here, the authors observe hot luminescence emitted by single-molecule chromophores that are electrically and mechanically self-decoupled by a tripodal scaffold.

    • Vibhuti Rai
    • , Nico Balzer
    •  & Michal Valášek

  • Article
    | Open Access

    To date the performance of molecular electronics compared to silicon limits their applications. Yang et al. develop the first mechano-optoelectronic switch based on mechanically controlled aggregation-induced emission of the self-assembled molecules, which can be reversibly switched at high speed.

    • Zhenyu Yang
    • , Pierre-André Cazade
    •  & Yuan Li

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Chirality induced spin selectivity is a process whereby a chiral molecule induces a spin-polarization to a current passing along the chiral molecule. The exact physical origin of the effect is still debated despite extensive experimental result. Here, Adhikari et al provide evidence for the important role of spin-orbit coupling in the normal metals that connect to the chiral molecule in CISS experiments.

    • Yuwaraj Adhikari
    • , Tianhan Liu
    •  & Peng Xiong

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Here, the authors devise a method, combining the break junction technique with a suspended heat-flux sensor, to measure the total thermal and electrical conductance of a single molecule, at room temperature, together with its Seebeck coefficient.

    • Andrea Gemma
    • , Fatemeh Tabatabaei
    •  & Bernd Gotsmann

  • Article
    | Open Access

    A common approach to design single-molecule switch is to use molecular backbones in response to external stimulus, but often requires complex organic synthesis. Here, Tong et al. show how to in situ control of the molecule-electrode contact using electrochemical gating to realize a reversible switch.

    • Ling Tong
    • , Zhou Yu
    •  & Xiao-Shun Zhou

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Doping is widely adopted to make organic semiconductors more conductive, yet the impact of molecular electronic properties on doping performance is still not fully understood. Armleder et al. compute host-dopant interactions and show that a short-range overscreening effect strongly affects conductivity.

    • Jonas Armleder
    • , Tobias Neumann
    •  & Artem Fediai

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Molecular electronics represents an avenue to enrich conventional electronics, but its reproducibility and scalability are still challenging. Here, the authors report the realization of multifunctional hybrid molecular graphene field effect transistors enabling operando spectroscopy and the implementation of optoelectronic logic gates.

    • Jorge Trasobares
    • , Juan Carlos Martín-Romano
    •  & Daniel Granados

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The limitation in metal-semiconductor contact has been a major challenge for high-performance organic field-effect transistors. Here, the authors fabricate the contact by transferring platinum electrode on solution-processed organic films, realizing ultralow total contact resistance down to 14 Ω ∙ cm.

    • Junpeng Zeng
    • , Daowei He
    •  & Xinran Wang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Quantum interference effect in the conductance of single molecule junctions has been attracting intensive interest in recent years. Here, Li and Selzer show the presence of intermolecular quantum interference over 40,000 molecules in a molecular ensemble junction with bismuth as the top electrode.

    • Ping’an Li
    •  & Yoram Selzer

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Guiding chemical reactions in a predictable and controllable manner is an ultimate goal of chemistry. Here, the authors show tuning of the single-molecule Mizoroki-Heck catalytic cycle through electrical gating and direct in-situ detection.

    • Lei Zhang
    • , Chen Yang
    •  & Xuefeng Guo

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Magnetic effects can emerge due to structural variations when the size of materials is reduced towards the nanoscale. Here, Chakrabarti et al demonstrates the opposite effect, showing that the interatomic distance in atomic wires changes by up to 20% depending on the orientation of an applied magnetic field.

    • Sudipto Chakrabarti
    • , Ayelet Vilan
    •  & Oren Tal

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Organic polymer nanomechanics has been explored through precise nanometre-scale stiffness measurements in a high-mobility semiconducting polymer. Higher eigen-mode atomic force microscopy is used to measure nanomechnical variations in the film texture, as well as the nanoscale order in the material.

    • Illia Dobryden
    • , Vladimir V. Korolkov
    •  & Deepak Venkateshvaran

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Developing molecular electronics is challenged by integrating fragile organic molecules into modern micro/nanoelectronics based on inorganic semiconductors. Li et al. apply rolled-up nanotechnology to assemble on-chip molecular devices, which can be switched between photodiodes and volatile memristors.

    • Tianming Li
    • , Martin Hantusch
    •  & Oliver G. Schmidt

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Proteins are promising molecular materials for next-generation electronic devices. Here, the authors fabricated printable digital logic circuits comprising resistors and diodes from self-assembled photosystem I complexes that enable pulse modulation.

    • Xinkai Qiu
    •  & Ryan C. Chiechi

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Development of organic electronic materials relies on understanding structure-function relationships in conjugated polymers but the synthetic workload to make large numbers of new compounds presents a practical barrier to properly survey conjugated organic derivatives. Here, the authors use automated synthesis to prepare a library of conjugated oligomers with systematically varied side chain composition followed by single-molecule characterization of charge transport.

    • Songsong Li
    • , Edward R. Jira
    •  & Charles M. Schroeder

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Conventional silicon-based transistors, which sit at the heart of every computer, are fast approaching the limit of miniaturisation. Here, Meng et al demonstrate a field-effect transistor composed of a single rutheniumdiarylethene molecule with large on/off ratio.

    • Linan Meng
    • , Na Xin
    •  & Xuefeng Guo

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Single molecules on metal surfaces are paradigmatic systems for the study of many-body phenomena. Here, the authors show that several spectroscopic experiments on iron phthalocyanine on Au(111) surface can be described in a unified way in terms of a strongly interacting topologically non-trivial (non-Landau) Fermi liquid.

    • R. Žitko
    • , G. G. Blesio
    •  & A. A. Aligia

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The versatility of DNA has inspired many single-molecule investigations utilizing nanotechnology. Harashima et al. have a somewhat different take on the subject and study a zipper configuration bridging electrodes that resembles an active electro-mechanical component instead.

    • Takanori Harashima
    • , Shintaro Fujii
    •  & Tomoaki Nishino

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Single-molecular magnets (SMM) are promising candidates for quantum technologies given the ease of repeatable manufacture and potential as qudits. Here, Biard et al succeed in electronically reading out a SMM containing two high-spin terbium atoms, allowing for a 16 dimensional Hilbert space.

    • Hugo Biard
    • , Eufemio Moreno-Pineda
    •  & Franck Balestro

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The integration of nano-molecules into microelectronic circuitry is challenging. Here, the authors provide a scalable method for contacting a self-assembled monolayer of nanoparticles with a single layer of graphene that produces single-electron effects, in the form of a Coulomb staircase, with a yield of at least 70%.

    • Joel M. Fruhman
    • , Hippolyte P.A.G. Astier
    •  & Christopher J. B. Ford

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Exploiting negative capacitance effects in organic thin-film transistors (OTFTs) is advantageous for enhancing device performance. Here, the authors report solution-processed sub-thermionic OTFTs and circuits with ferroelectric hafnium oxides that show ultra-low power and ultra-high gain.

    • Zhongzhong Luo
    • , Boyu Peng
    •  & Xinran Wang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The commercialisation of organic photovoltaic technology calls for research on material degradation mechanisms. Ramirez et al. show that triplet excitons produced by back charge transfer can significantly impact the photo-stability of fullerene-based devices even in the absence of water and oxygen.

    • Ivan Ramirez
    • , Alberto Privitera
    •  & Moritz Riede

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The mechanism of nonlinear charge transport in doped conducting polymers remains elusive. Here, Wang et al. study charge transport with respect to crystalline degrees of samples and construct a model based on the tied link between Fermi liquids and Luttinger liquids, providing a universal explanation to understand nonlinear charge transport in conducting polymers.

    • Jiawei Wang
    • , Jiebin Niu
    •  & Ming Liu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The development of molecular electronics at single molecule level calls for new tools beyond electrical characterisation. Kos et al. show an optical probe of molecular junctions in a plasmonic nanocavity geometry, which supports in situ interrogation of molecular configurations.

    • Dean Kos
    • , Giuliana Di Martino
    •  & Jeremy J. Baumberg

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Designing efficient organic solar cells is limited by the energy required to overcome the mutual Coulomb attraction between electron and hole. Here, the authors reveal long-lived and disorder-free charge-transfer states enable efficient endothermic charge separation in non-fullerene systems with marginal energy offset.

    • Ture F. Hinrichsen
    • , Christopher C. S. Chan
    •  & Philip C. Y. Chow

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The demand for miniaturization of electronics has been motivating a growing interest in high-performance molecular electronics. Li, Bandari et al. report a fully integrated molecular rectifier based on a molecular heterojunction and microtubular electrode enabling high frequency operation at more than 10 MHz.

    • Tianming Li
    • , Vineeth Kumar Bandari
    •  & Oliver G. Schmidt

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Electrically manipulating molecular magnetism is a challenge to overcome for applications in high-density storage. Here, the authors use inelastic electron tunneling spectroscopy to show that a vibron-assisted spin excitation in a nickel-nickelocene complex exceeds a pure spin excitation in energy and amplitude.

    • N. Bachellier
    • , B. Verlhac
    •  & L. Limot

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Molecular electronics holds promise for device miniaturization yet can only be realized by choosing specially designed molecular species to date. Here, Shin et al. show tunable rectifying characteristics in a molecular heterojunction with non-functionalized molecules and two-dimensional semiconductors.

    • Jaeho Shin
    • , Seunghoon Yang
    •  & Gunuk Wang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Although artificial Lieb lattices have been recently synthesized, the realization of a Lieb lattice in a real material is still challenging. Here the authors use tight-binding and first principle calculations to predict tunable topology and magnetism in recently discovered two-dimensional covalent-organic frameworks.

    • Bin Cui
    • , Xingwen Zheng
    •  & Bing Huang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Quantum interference can be used to control electronic transport with high sensitivity at the nanoscale. Pal et al. show that without the need for magnetic materials, quantum interference can also filter spin transport approaching the limit of ideal spin-polarized ballistic transport in molecular junctions.

    • Atindra Nath Pal
    • , Dongzhe Li
    •  & Oren Tal

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