Molecular Memristors and Spinristors in silico: How to Turn Endohedral Fullerenes into Molecular Electronics Components
Michal Straka
1Institute of Organic Chemistry and Biochemistry of the Czech Academy of Sciences, Flemingovo nám. CZ–16610, Prague, Czech Republic, straka [at] uochb [dot] cas [dot] cz
Here we present endohedral fullerene based electric-field driven molecular switches that can variably rectify electric current and filter spin. The concept of molecular memristor1–3 is based on MX@C70 endohedral fullerenes connected to electrodes, where MX is a dipolar system (M: metal, X: non-metal). We demonstrate in silico that (a) the orientation of MX in the cage can be enforced (“write” function) by applied (large) voltage on electrodes, while (b) the conductivity of MX@C70 systems depends on the orientation of MX and can be retrieved (“read” function) also by (a small) applied voltage. This is a behaviour of a memristor – a resistive component, the conductance of which depends on the voltage that has been previously applied to it. The concept of molecular spinristor aka spin-filtering memristor4 goes further and uses an open-shell metal atom, like Ti enclosed in a fullerene cage. The metal atom can also be manipulated inside the cage by electric field to different minimum positions, that feature different rectification properties. In addition, the open-shell electronic structure of the systems provides a spin-filtering function.
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- https://chemrxiv.org/engage/chemrxiv/article-details/6148b0207c08d54d9649c1bd