Issue 6, 2024

Oxazine: an anchoring group serving as functional kernels to construct single-molecule switches

Abstract

As a central research target in molecular electronics, molecular switches have been extensively explored over the past decades. We theoretically demonstrate that when linking appropriate conjugated molecules to carbon electrodes, the de/rehydrogenation of 1,4-oxazine linkers efficiently switches single-molecule junctions between a low-conducting and a high-conducting state. This change is attributed to the modified energy gap of the central molecule as well as the charge rearrangement at the molecule–electrode interfaces. Based on the above findings, a single-molecule junction, employing an intramolecular proton transfer reaction as the switching mechanism, has been proposed. This realizes a maximum ON/OFF current ratio as high as 1.5 × 103. Furthermore, we show that an electrostatic gate field can control the proton transfer process and thus allow specific conductance states to be selected. Our findings provide a new perspective for the design of single-molecule switches relying on the anchoring groups rather than on the specific molecular backbones.

Graphical abstract: Oxazine: an anchoring group serving as functional kernels to construct single-molecule switches

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
12 out 2023
Accepted
03 jan 2024
First published
03 jan 2024

J. Mater. Chem. C, 2024,12, 2194-2202

Oxazine: an anchoring group serving as functional kernels to construct single-molecule switches

S. Li, Y. Jiang, Y. Wang, D. Lin, H. Pan, Y. Wang, S. Sanvito and S. Hou, J. Mater. Chem. C, 2024, 12, 2194 DOI: 10.1039/D3TC03720G

To request permission to reproduce material from this article, please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

If you are an author contributing to an RSC publication, you do not need to request permission provided correct acknowledgement is given.

If you are the author of this article, you do not need to request permission to reproduce figures and diagrams provided correct acknowledgement is given. If you want to reproduce the whole article in a third-party publication (excluding your thesis/dissertation for which permission is not required) please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

Read more about how to correctly acknowledge RSC content.

Social activity

Spotlight

Advertisements