Pair Tunneling through Single Molecules

2005/10/31 by Jens Koch, M. E. Raikh, M. É. Raǐkh +1 · 98 citations
Engineering · Physics and Astronomy · #Atomic physics #Charge (physics) #Condensed matter physics #Coulomb #Coulomb blockade #Current (fluid) #Electron #Ground state #Molecular Junctions and Nanostructures #Molecule #Physics #Quantum and electron transport phenomena #Quantum mechanics #Quantum tunnelling #Rectification #Semiconductor materials and devices #Transistor #Tunnel effect #Voltage #cond-mat.mes-hall #cond-mat.mtrl-sci

paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevlett.96.056803

published in Physical Review Letters 96(5), 056803 (American Physical Society) · 4+ pages, 4 figures; minor changes, version published in Phys. Rev. Lett

openalex publication_date 2006/02/09 · arxiv created 2006/02/20 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05

Abstract

By a polaronic energy shift, the effective charging energy of molecules can become negative, favoring ground states with even numbers of electrons. Here we show that charge transport through such molecules near ground-state degeneracies is dominated by tunneling of electron pairs which coexists with (featureless) single-electron cotunneling. Because of the restricted phase space for pair tunneling, the current-voltage characteristics exhibit striking differences from the conventional Coulomb blockade. In asymmetric junctions, pair tunneling can be used for gate-controlled current rectification and switching.

Citations

• Heavy-fermion behavior in a negative-UAnderson model
• Many-Body Effects on the Transport Properties of Single-Molecule Devices
• Model for the Electronic Structure of Amorphous Semiconductors

Cited by

• Autonomous oscillations in quantum electromechanics: tensor network treatment
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• Charge Kondo behavior and its robustness in external environments in a single molecular magnet device with attractive on-site Coulomb interaction
• Transport in molecular states language: Generalized quantum master equation approach
• Electron pair current through the correlated quantum dot
• Electron-phonon correlation effects in molecular transistors
• Nonequilibrium charge-Kondo transport through negative-Umolecules
• Kinetic equations for transport through single-molecule transistors
• Spin-charge separation and simultaneous spin and charge Kondo effect
• Dissipative two-electron transfer: A numerical renormalization group study
• Electron transport in nanoscale junctions with local anharmonic modes
• Quantum Monte Carlo results for bipolaron stability in quantum dots
• Real-time renormalization group and cutoff scales in nonequilibrium applied to an arbitrary quantum dot in the Coulomb blockade regime
• Full counting statistics and shot noise of cotunneling in quantum dots and single-molecule transistors
• Electronic transport through magnetic molecules with soft vibrating modes
• Slave boson theory for transport through magnetic molecules with vibronic states
• Tunneling of hybridized pairs of electrons through a one-dimensional channel
• Transport and excitations in a negative-U quantum dot at the LaAlO 3 /SrTiO 3 interface. [europepmc]

Related

• Electron transport through a diatomic molecule
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• Electronegativity in quantum electronic transport
• Three-body scattering problem and two-electron tunneling in molecular wires
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