Three years ago, Jülich physicists succeeded in erecting a single flat molecule in a controlled manner. Now, after months of experimentation, they have turned it upside down again. The insights gained are an important step towards molecular manufacturing in three dimensions.
The idea of assembling electrical components and circuits at the level of atoms and molecules piece by piece, similar to larger machines, is one of the central goals of nanotechnology. The current result, which Jülich researchers have achieved with partners from the University of Warwick in England, opens up new avenues for this, for example to realize ultra-sensitive sensors or quantum dots for storing quantum information in quantum computers. The aim was to find out exactly how stable such a standing molecule really is. By increasing the temperature, the molecule was shaken more and more until it finally fell over. To achieve the necessary accuracy, the molecule has to be uprighted and overturned several hundred times. Furthermore, it is difficult to determine when the molecule falls over. The tip of the microscope is huge compared to a single molecule and stabilizes it through electromagnetic interaction as long as it is close to it. For this reason, a procedure was developed in which the tip is alternately retracted and brought back closer to the molecule.
In nanoscale production, tiny structures are built up layer by layer and partially etched away again. However, it may also be possible to produce such components in other ways in the future. One approach is to assemble them from individual molecules, as with Lego bricks.
