2005/12/24 by В. В. Погосов, Valentin V. Pogosov, Pogosov, Valentin V. +3
Engineering · Physics and Astronomy · #FOS: Physical sciences #Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics (cond-mat.mes-hall) #Molecular Junctions and Nanostructures #Quantum and electron transport phenomena #Surface and Thin Film Phenomena #cond-mat.mes-hall
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.cond-mat/0512633
10 pages, 7 figures
arxiv created 2005/12/24 · openalex publication_date 2005/12/24 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Effects of the single-electron tunneling and the Coulomb blockade in a cluster structure (the molecular transistor) are investigated theoretically. In the framework of the particle-in-a-box model for the spherical and disk-shaped gold clusters, the electron spectrum, the temperature dependence of the chemical potential and the residual charge are calculated. We show that the residual charge is equal to the non-integer value of elementary charge e and depends on the cluster's shape. The equations for the analysis of the current-voltage characteristic are used under conservation condition for the total energy of the structure taking into account the contact potential difference. Restrictions associated with the Coulomb instability of a cluster are introduced into the theory in a the simple way. It is shown that the critical charge of the cluster in the open electron system is close to the residual charge. For single-electron transistors based on small gold clusters the current gap and its voltage asymmetry are computed. We demonstrate that the current gap exhibits non-monotonic size dependences, which are related to the quantization of the electron spectrum and the Coulomb blockade.