Single-Molecule Conductance through Hydrogen Bonds - American

Jul 18, 2016 - Arizona State University School of Molecular Sciences Physical Sciences Center PSD-D102, Tempe, Arizona 85287, United States. ‡. Cent...
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Letter

Single-Molecule Conductance Through Hydrogen Bonds. The Role of Resonances. Micah Wimmer, Julio L Palma, Pilarisetty Tarakeshwar, and Vladimiro Mujica J. Phys. Chem. Lett., Just Accepted Manuscript • DOI: 10.1021/acs.jpclett.6b01318 • Publication Date (Web): 18 Jul 2016 Downloaded from http://pubs.acs.org on July 18, 2016

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The Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters

Single-molecule Conductance Through Hydrogen bonds. The Role of Resonances. Micah Wimmer1, Julio L. Palma2, Pilarisetty Tarakeshwar1, and Vladimiro Mujica*,1,3 1

Arizona State University School of Molecular Sciences Physical Sciences Center PSDD102 Tempe, AZ 85287 2 Center for Biosensors and Bioelectronics, Biodesign Institute, Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona 85287, USA 3 Donostia International Physics Center (DIPC) Manuel Lardizabal Ibilbidea, 4, 20018 Donostia, Gipuzkoa, Spain * [email protected]

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Abstract:

The single-molecule conductance of hydrogen-bonded and alkane systems are compared in this theoretical investigation. The results indicate that for short chains, the H-bonded molecules exhibit larger conductance than the alkanes. While earlier experimental investigations attributed this observation to a large density of states (DOS) corresponding to an occupied molecular orbital below the Fermi energy, the current work indicates the presence of a Fano resonance in the transmission function in the vicinity of the Fermi energy. The inclusion of this observation is essential in understanding the behavior of these systems. We also address the characteristics of the H-bond for transport and provide an explanation for the presence of a turnover regime wherein the conductance of the alkanes becomes larger than the H-bonded systems. Incidentally, this feature cannot be explained using a simple DOS argument.

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As has been emphasized in earlier studies by Kurlancheek and Cave, bond strength does not necessarily translate into better transport properties, and their calculations show modest differences between tunneling mediated by weak bonds as compared to σ and π-bonds.1 Furthermore, it is not clear that molecular orbitals can be obviously interpreted as conduction channels, as analyzed in detail in the work of Solomon et al.2 However, judging how the strength of a bond affects the transport effectiveness through a molecule is an important subject. For example, in a recent study using an STM break junction technique, Nishino et al found that nano-junctions including molecules with hydrogen bonds exhibit enhanced electron transport compared with alkanes for short inter-electrode distances (