Piva Reports Findings on Alterations to Single-molecule Conductivity by a Charged Surface Atom

Paul G. Piva and colleagues report that although electrical transport through molecules has been much investigated and research has shown that single-molecule electronic effects have been observed, transport is sensitive to structural variations on the atomic scale. Understanding how the structural features affect such properties is of importance. His group has demonstrated that the electrostatic field emanating from a fixed point charge regulates the conductivity of nearby substrate-bound molecules. These results show that molecular conduction is shifted by altering the charge state of a silicon surface atom, or by varying the spatial relationship between the molecule and that charged center. Read their article, appearing in Nature, here.