Crystalline Thin Film of a Donor-Substituted Cyanoethynylethene for Nanoscale Data Recording Through Intermolecular Charge Transfer Interactions
Guiyuan Jiang, Tsuyoshi Michinobu, Wenfang Yuan, Min Feng, Yongqiang Wen, Shixuan Du, Hongjun Gao, Lei Jiang, Yanlin Song, *François Diederich, * Daoben Zhu
High-quality crystalline thin films were prepared by vacuum vapor deposition of N,N-dimethylanilino donor-substituted tricyanoethynylethene acceptors. Nanoscale data recording on these films was achieved by STM with a storage density of about 1013 bits/cm2. The recording is based on an electric-field-induced intermolecular charge transfer mechanism which is strongly influenced by the ordered, antiparallel packing mode of the dipolar donor-acceptor molecules in the film.
Adv. Mater. 2005, 17, 2170 - 2173
Fig1. a) TEM electron diffraction of TDMEE thin film, showing that the film is well crystallized. b) The packing arrangement of TDMEE molecules in the crystalline thin film, showing the regular alternate donor/acceptor stacks.
Fig. 2. a) STM image of a nanoscale “v” pattern recorded on the TDMEE thin film by applying a pulse voltage of 2.64 V, 10 ms. STM was performed in constant height mode with set points of Vbias = 0.34 V and Iref = 0.06 nA. The average diameter of the marks is about 2.1 nm. b) Typical STM current-voltage curves for (Ⅰ) unrecorded and (Ⅱ) recorded regions of the TDMEE thin film.
