Selfassembly of α,ω‐dithiols on surfaces and metal dithiol heterostructures

Abstract

α,ω-Dithiols present an interesting case of molecules with two reactive terminal -SH groups (HS-R-SH) that allow their use as binders between different metallic entities. They have thus been used in molecular electronics conduction measurements, in "nanogap" electrodes of interest in plasmonics, as building blocks of more complex structures such as metal intercalated superlattices and in the formation of metalized organic thin films, including doped graphene type films. There exist however many problems, because the molecules may end up in undesirable configurations with both thiol terminals bound to the same metal particle/substrate or link with other molecules to produce "multi-molecule" or "multilayer" structures. This report discusses various key questions on dithiol linking with metal surfaces and the quest of protocols of making problem free dithiol metal structures. It then describes the use of dithiols and their SAMs to produce various metal organic heterostructures useful for molecular electronics and formation of doped metalized organic thin films. We discuss the build up of these structures by self assembly and lithography, their chemical composition and functional properties.

Impact of the Crosslinker’s Molecular Structure on the Aggregation of Gold Nanoparticles

“…This interpretation is also in accordance with structural models of dithiol-self assembled monolayers (SAMs) on planar gold substrates [33,34].…”

“…Second, there is a chance that the NON linker does not crosslink different particles, but binds with both thiol groups on one particles (a process termed backbonding or loop formation [33]), thus strongly destabilising the particles and inducing aggregation. The aromatic molecules, in contrast, are even claimed to stand perpendicular on the particles surface [33,34].…”

Enhancing Reproducibility and Nonlocal Effects in Film‐Coupled Nanoantennas

“…Unfortunately, due to the double sulfur anchor, these works often reported difficulties with achieving SAM qualities comparable to single alkylthiol SAMs. More recently, a number of papers have furthered understanding of the required SAM deposition conditions concerning molecules concentration, chain length and solvent type . One of the most striking results was obtained by Ciracì et al using alkylamine molecules to assemble gold nanospheres, although underlying the limitation of such design in terms of electric field enhancement and addressable spectral range .…”

Dioxygen insensitive C70/AuNPs hybrid system for rapid and quantitative glucose biosensing

“…Higher photoemission peaks related to free thiols were observed at 163.6 eV for S 2p 3/2 and 164.8 eV for S 2p 1/2 . 34 Both doublets had the expected splitting of 1.2 eV and intensity ratio of 2 : 1. No higher binding energy signals 35 were observed, implying that the obtained nanomaterial did not oxidize easily during exposition to air.…”