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Switching Effects in Molecular Electronic Devices

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Abstract

The creation of molecular electronic switches by using smart molecules is of great importance to the field of molecular electronics. This requires a fundamental understanding of the intrinsic electron transport mechanisms, which depend on several factors including the charge transport pathway, the molecule–electrode coupling strength, the energy of the molecular frontier orbitals, and the electron spin state. On the basis of significant progresses achieved in both experiments and theory over the past decade, in this review article we focus on new insights into the design and fabrication of different molecular switches and the corresponding switching effects, which is crucial to the development of molecular electronics. We summarize the strategies developed for single-molecule device fabrication and the mechanism of these switching effects. These analyses should be valuable for deeply understanding the switching effects in molecular electronic devices.

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Fig. 1

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [24]. Copyright 2005 Nature Publishing Group

Fig. 2

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [25]. Copyright 2013 Wiley-VCH

Fig. 3

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [41]. Copyright 2006 AAAS

Fig. 4

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [40]. Copyright 2011 American Chemical Society. Reproduced with permission from Ref. [34]. Copyright 2012 Wiley-VCH

Fig. 5

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [34]. Copyright 2012 Wiley-VCH. Reproduced with permission from Ref. [44]. Copyright 2013 Wiley-VCH

Fig. 6

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [45]. Copyright 2007 American Chemical Society

Fig. 7

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [11]. Copyright 2012 Wiley-VCH

Fig. 8

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [49]. Copyright 2016 AAAS

Fig. 9

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [51]. Copyright 2015 Nature Publishing Group

Fig. 10

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [53]. Copyright 2014 American Chemical Society

Fig. 11

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [54]. Copyright 2016 The Royal Society of Chemistry. Reproduced with permission from Ref. [22]. Copyright 2015 Wiley-VCH

Fig. 12

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [55]. Copyright 2011 Nature Publishing Group. Reproduced with permission from Ref. [56]. Copyright 2012 AAAS

Fig. 13

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [59]. Copyright 2015 American Chemical Society

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Reproduced with permission from Ref. [52, 70]. Copyright 2014 American Chemical Society

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Reproduced with permission from Ref. [59]. Copyright 2012 American Chemical Society

Fig. 16

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [59]. Copyright 2012 American Chemical Society

Fig. 17

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [76]. Copyright 2016 American Chemical Society

Fig. 18

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [77]. Copyright 2016 American Chemical Society

Fig. 19

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [49]. Copyright 2016 AAAS

Fig. 20

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [84]. Copyright 2014 Nature Publishing Group

Fig. 21

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [90]. Copyright 2013 Royal Society of Chemistry

Fig. 22

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [91]. Copyright 2014 Wiley-VCH

Fig. 23

Reproduced with permission from Ref. [97]. Copyright 2013 Nature Publishing Group

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Funds of China (21225311, 91333102, and 21373014) and the 973 Project (2012CB921404 and 2012CB921403).

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  1. Zihao Liu and Shizhao Ren contributed equally to this work.

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  1. Beijing National Laboratory for Molecular Sciences, State Key Laboratory for Structural Chemistry of Unstable and Stable Species, College of Chemistry and Molecular Engineering, Peking University, Beijing, 100871, People’s Republic of China

    Zihao Liu, Shizhao Ren & Xuefeng Guo

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This article is part of the Topical Collection “Molecular-Scale Electronics: Current Status and Perspective”; edited by Xuefeng Guo.

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Liu, Z., Ren, S. & Guo, X. Switching Effects in Molecular Electronic Devices. Top Curr Chem (Z) 375, 56 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s41061-017-0144-5

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