Journal of Physical Chemistry C
Journal of Physical Chemistry C
5 years ago

Tuning Intermolecular Charge Transfer in Donor–Acceptor Two-Dimensional Crystals on Metal Surfaces

Tuning Intermolecular Charge Transfer in Donor–Acceptor Two-Dimensional Crystals on Metal Surfaces
Manuel Alcamí, Sergio Díaz-Tendero, José M. Gallego, Fernando Martín, Borja Cirera, Marcos Domínguez-Rivera, Fabián Calleja, Jonathan Rodríguez-Fernández, Rodolfo Miranda, Koen Lauwaet, Roberto Otero, Amadeo L. Vázquez de Parga, David Écija, Maitreyi Robledo, Luca Floreano, Alberto Martín-Jiménez
Organic charge transfer (CT) compounds display a wide range of exotic electronic properties (charge-density wave stabilization, Peierls transitions, etc.) depending on the amount of charge transferred from the donor (D) to the acceptor (A) species. A complete exploration of the complex electronic phase diagrams for such compounds would thus require methods to systematically tune the amount of charge exchanged in the CT process. This has proven however challenging in the past: chemical functionalization of the constituent molecules can also affect the packing of the molecular units in the crystal, whereas changing D:A stoichiometry is often not possible in the bulk. Interestingly, it was recently found that multiple stoichiometries can actually be achieved by codeposition of different amounts of D and A molecules on metal surfaces. The question, however, of whether CT processes between D and A molecules can be tuned with the D:A ratio in such mixtures has not yet been studied, and it is no trivial matter, since competing CT processes between the metal surface and the organic adsorbates might hinder interadsorbate charge transfer. Here we demonstrate that the CT process from the organic donor tetrathiafulvalene (TTF) to the acceptor tetracyanoquino-p-dimethane (TCNQ) can be tuned with exquisite accuracy (∼0.1 e–) by controlling the stoichiometry of D:A cocrystals deposited on Ag(111). This control opens new avenues to explore the complex phase diagrams of organic CT compounds and to tailor their electronic properties.

Publisher URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/acs.jpcc.7b08017

DOI: 10.1021/acs.jpcc.7b08017

You might also like
Discover & Discuss Important Research

Keeping up-to-date with research can feel impossible, with papers being published faster than you'll ever be able to read them. That's where Researcher comes in: we're simplifying discovery and making important discussions happen. With over 19,000 sources, including peer-reviewed journals, preprints, blogs, universities, podcasts and Live events across 10 research areas, you'll never miss what's important to you. It's like social media, but better. Oh, and we should mention - it's free.

  • Download from Google Play
  • Download from App Store
  • Download from AppInChina

Researcher displays publicly available abstracts and doesn’t host any full article content. If the content is open access, we will direct clicks from the abstracts to the publisher website and display the PDF copy on our platform. Clicks to view the full text will be directed to the publisher website, where only users with subscriptions or access through their institution are able to view the full article.