Electrochemically controlled rectification in symmetric single-molecule junctions

Research output: Contribution to journalResearch articleContributedpeer-review

Contributors

  • Zixiao Wang - , Nanjing University (Author)
  • Julio L. Palma - , Pennsylvania State University (Author)
  • Hui Wang - , Nanjing University (Author)
  • Junzhi Liu - , State Key Laboratory of Synthetic Chemistry (Author)
  • Gang Zhou - , Fudan University (Author)
  • M. R. Ajayakumar - , Chair of Molecular Functional Materials (cfaed) (Author)
  • Xinliang Feng - , Chair of Molecular Functional Materials (cfaed) (Author)
  • Wei Wang - , Nanjing University (Author)
  • Jens Ulstrup - , Technical University of Denmark (Author)
  • Alexei A. Kornyshev - , Imperial College London (Author)
  • Yueqi Li - , University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) (Author)
  • Nongjian Tao - , Nanjing University, Arizona State University (Author)

Abstract

Single-molecule electrochemical science has advanced over the past decades and now extends well beyond molecular imaging, to molecular electronics functions such as rectification and amplification. Rectification is conceptually the simplest but has involved mostly challenging chemical synthesis of asymmetric molecular structures or asymmetric materials and geometry of the two enclosing electrodes. Here we propose an experimental and theoretical strategy for building and tuning in situ (in operando) rectification in two symmetric molecular structures in electrochemical environment. The molecules were designed to conduct electronically via either their lowest unoccupied molecular orbital (LUMO; electron transfer) or highest occupied molecular orbital (HOMO; "hole transfer"). We used a bipotentiostat to control separately the electrochemical potential of the tip and substrate electrodes of an electrochemical scanning tunneling microscope (EC-STM), which leads to independent energy alignment of the STM tip, the molecule, and the STM substrate. By creating an asymmetric energy alignment, we observed single-molecule rectification of each molecule within a voltage range of ±0.5 V. By varying both the dominating charge transporting LUMO or HOMO energy and the electrolyte concentration, we achieved tuning of the polarity as well as the amplitude of the rectification. We have extended an earlier proposed theory that predicts electrolyte-controlled rectification to rationalize all the observed in situ rectification features and found excellent agreement between theory and experiments. Our study thus offers a way toward building controllable single-molecule rectifying devices without involving asymmetric molecular structures.

Details

Original languageEnglish
Article numbere2122183119
JournalProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America : PNAS
Volume119
Issue number39
Publication statusPublished - 27 Sept 2022
Peer-reviewedYes

External IDs

PubMed 36136968

Keywords

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Keywords

  • bipotential control, electrolytic control, symmetric single-molecule junctions, tunneling current rectification

Library keywords