Physical Chemistry Seminar: Patterned Self-Assembled Monolayer: A Conducting Single-Layer Material by Design

Abstract:

Self-assembled silane monolayers are remarkably robust one-molecule-thick films that may be prepared on a large variety of polar solid substrates by spontaneous molecular self-assembly at the interface with a fluid phase. The nondestructive surface functionalization and patterning of such highly ordered monolayers offers access to a generic single-layer functional material that may be designed for diverse tasks. A brief overview of the methodology advanced for this purpose will be followed by a description of its recent application in the realization of a new type of electrically conducting single-layer wires that exhibit unusual ionic and electronic conduction as function of their ionic composition, dimensions (definable over length scales extending from nanometer to centimeter), and the nature of the underlying solid substrate. These findings point to so far unidentified interfacial and lateral confinement effects, the elucidation and possible exploitation of which posing many interesting challenges for further research.

A conductive monolayer surface of the present type, generated by the patterning process itself, represents an inherently patternable and reusable single-layer material, free of the basic difficulties arising in the patterning of graphene and other recently investigated single-layer electronic conductors.

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