分子电子学已成为21世纪研究的热点.通过将具有特定功能的分子连接在纳米尺度金属电极之间从而构筑包括分子导线、开关、整流器在内的各种分子尺度电子器件,这引起了科学家们广泛的研究兴趣.在分子电子学研究中,构筑金属/分子/金属(MMM)分子结是研究分子器件中电子传输性质的关键.尽管已经取得了很大的进展,目前在纳米尺度下构筑稳定可靠的MMM分子结并测试单个分子的电学性质仍然面临很多挑战.本文着重对单分子电学性质的测试技术和相关理论研究的最新进展以及存在的挑战做了概述.
Molecular electronics has become an important research field in the past decade,and molecular devices can be used as molecular wires,switches,rectifiers,and transistors etc.Construction of metal/molecule/metal (MMM) junctions is the most effective method for investigating the charge transport properties of molecular devices.However,the measurement of individual molecule junctions at the nanoscale is still very challenging because of many technical difficulties.This paper reviews the recent progress and the challenges in the measurement of single molecule conductance,and summarizes investigation of the charge transport mechanism.