Borges A, Xia J, Liu SH, Venkataraman L, Solomon GC. The Role of Through-Space Interactions in Modulating Constructive and Destructive Interference Effects in Benzene.
NANO LETTERS 2017;
17:4436-4442. [PMID:
28650176 DOI:
10.1021/acs.nanolett.7b01592]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 23] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 05/20/2023]
Abstract
Quantum interference effects, whether constructive or destructive, are key to predicting and understanding the electrical conductance of single molecules. Here, through theory and experiment, we investigate a family of benzene-like molecules that exhibit both constructive and destructive interference effects arising due to more than one contact between the molecule and each electrode. In particular, we demonstrate that the π-system of meta-coupled benzene can exhibit constructive interference and its para-coupled analog can exhibit destructive interference, and vice versa, depending on the specific through-space interactions. As a peculiarity, this allows a meta-coupled benzene molecule to exhibit higher conductance than a para-coupled benzene. Our results provide design principles for molecular electronic components with high sensitivity to through-space interactions and demonstrate that increasing the number of contacts between the molecule and electrodes can both increase and decrease the conductance.
Collapse