Molecular charge transport is of interest for functionalization and miniaturization of electronic devices. Use of molecular monolayers offers a more applicative route and better reproducibility than work with single molecules. We show that Si-molecular monolayer / Pb junctions (Figure 1) overcome two major obstacles facing monolayer devices.The first is diffusion of metal atoms through a molecular monolayer, assembled on a substrate electrode. We suggest that the affinity between the deposited metal and the underlying substrate drives diffusion and creation of shorts. Thus a judicious match of non-interacting top and bottom electrodes, such as Pb and Si reduces formation of short-circuiting defects below a detectable electrical effect, even for thermally-evaporated Pb.1The second is poor reproducibility of measured molecular transport. We show that a) strong covalent bonding, b) strict elimination of surface oxidation, and c) minimal surface corrugation to limit chemically active �hot-spots�,2  all contribute to achieving remarkable reproducibility in current � voltage response of Si-molecular monolayer / Pb junctions.We used our cumulative experience for producing stand-alone, 10 �m wide junctions, within a thick SiO2  layer. These junctions could be cycled thousands of times and cooled down to < 100K without altering their performance.Figure 1: Cross section TEM of a Si(111)/Br-styrene/Pb junction.1. Lovrincic, Vilan, et al., JPCL (2013), 4 , 426;2. Yaffe, Vilan, et al., JPCC, (2013), 10.1021/jp4027755

Incorporating molecular monolayers in standard Si device fabrication

247th National Meeting (2014)

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