Issue 35, 2022

Robust covalent pyrazine anchors forming highly conductive and polarity-tunable molecular junctions with carbon electrodes

Abstract

In molecular electronics, electrode–molecule anchoring strategies play a crucial role in the design of stable and high-performance functional single-molecule devices. Herein, we employ aromatic pyrazine as anchors to connect a central anthracene molecule to carbon electrodes including graphene and armchair single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs), and theoretically investigate their atomic structures and electronic transport properties. These molecular junctions can be constructed via condensation reactions of the central molecules terminated with ortho-phenylenediamines with ortho-quinone-functionalized nanogaps of graphene and SWCNT electrodes. With two direct C–N covalent bonds connecting the central molecule site-selectively to carbon electrodes in a coplanar way, pyrazine anchors are advantageous for forming stable and structurally well-defined molecular junctions, being expected to reduce the uncertainty about the electrode–molecule linkage motifs. The junction transport is highly efficient due to the coplanar geometry and the ensuing strong π-type molecule-electrode electronic coupling. Furthermore, our calculations show that molecular junctions with pyrazine anchors and carbon electrodes are usually n-type electronic devices; upon hydrogenation of pyridinic nitrogen atoms, the device polarity can be tuned to p-type, indicating that the pyrazine anchors can also serve as a powerful platform for tailoring in situ the polarity of charge carriers in carbon-electrode molecular electronic devices.

Graphical abstract: Robust covalent pyrazine anchors forming highly conductive and polarity-tunable molecular junctions with carbon electrodes

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
22 May 2022
Accepted
17 Aug 2022
First published
17 Aug 2022

Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys., 2022,24, 21337-21347

Robust covalent pyrazine anchors forming highly conductive and polarity-tunable molecular junctions with carbon electrodes

Y. Wang, H. Pan, D. Lin, S. Li, Y. Wang, S. Sanvito and S. Hou, Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys., 2022, 24, 21337 DOI: 10.1039/D2CP02318K

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