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Published on: May 27, 2018
Conformational molecular switch of the azobenzene molecule: a scanning tunneling microscopy study
Byoung-Young Choi1, Se-Jong Kahng, Seungchul Kim
1Department of Physics and Center for Science in Nanometer Scale, Seoul National University, Seoul 151-747, Korea.
Abstract:
We propose to utilize azobenzene as a nanomolecular switch which can be triggered by transmitting electrons above threshold biases. The effect is explained by an electron impact trans-cis conformational change of the isolated azobenzene molecules. The molecular electronic states of both isomers have been measured with spatially resolved scanning tunneling microscopy or spectroscopy, leading to suggested transition pathways of the electron-induced isomerization.
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