Photoactive molecular junctions

Keywords Charge transport Electrochemical molecular junctions Electron tunnelling Electron hopping Molecular electronics Photoactive molecular junctions... 

The simplest component of an electrical circuit is a wire, and the design of molecular wires has received a great deal of attention. In a broad sense, this term can be used to designate any molecular" structme able to mediate the transfer of electrons between appropriate electron donor and acceptor sites (electrodes, photoactive, and redox-active molecular components). In practice, different "conduction mechanisms may apply, depending on the molecular structure of the wire and on the type of experimental setup used (see below). Molecular wires were studied in a variety of experimental conditions, depending on the nature of the donor and acceptor terminals the wire is connected to. and on the method used to detect the electron flow. Available methods can be broadly divided into the following (Fig. 1) photoinduced eiectron transfer in donor-wire-acceptor systems (dyads), fast electrochemistry of adsorbed wire-electroactive group assemblies, and conductance [/(V)] measurements on metal-wire-metal junctions. 

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