Mini diode made from a single molecule

An efficient miniature diode, barely a nanometre, has been made from a single organic molecule.

As electronic devices continue to shrink, physicists will soon need to use individual molecules as circuit components. Now, a team including researchers from Curtin University have attached a molecule of the hydrocarbon nonadiyne to a silicon surface and placed a gold electrode on top to create a robust diode — a component that allows electrical current to flow in one direction and blocks it in the other. They passed 1.5 volts of power through the diode and found it allowed 4,000 times more current through in the forward direction than when reversed, making it several times more efficient than previously reported single molecule diodes.

More work is needed to improve the durability of these molecular circuits, which could revolutionize the miniaturization of electronics.

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Nature Communications 8, 15056 (2017).