Proceedings of nanoGe September Meeting 2015 (NFM15)
Publication date: 8th June 2015
For macroscopic objects, it can be relatively easy to determine their electrical resistance; in fact there exists an electronic color code to mark the resistance values of resistors used in circuits. In downscaling the size of electronic components, molecules are viewed as promising alternatives as they can have additional functionality built-in by chemical design. At Delft, we have developed several techniques to create (three-terminal) single-molecule devices, in which molecules are trapped from solution. These include (gated) mechanical controlled break junctions, a self-breaking electromigration technique and by electroburning of few-layer graphene, room-temperature stable molecular transistors. With these techniques in place, we are investigating charge transport across a wide variety of molecules. I will discuss some examples of this study, including a quantum-interference switch, and negative differential resistance devices and rectifiers. Simple models will be introduced that capture the essential aspects of the measurements.