Attaining Configuration and Ligand Field Control over the Singly Occupied Molecular Orbital (SOMO)/Fermi Gap in Molecular Langmuir-Blodgett (LB) Films

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Surfactants are molecules that contain water-soluble and water-insoluble regions. When added to water, surfactants form well-organized films as thin as a single molecule, and this film can be transferred onto a solid surface. Surfactant molecules can be designed to incorporate metal centers to form a new and advanced class of metallosurfactants that can be tailored to respond to specific electrical stimuli. With funding from the Macromolecular, Supramolecular and Nanochemistry program of the NSF Division of Chemistry, Professor Claudio Verani and his research group at Wayne State University in Detroit are studying how to design and obtain new responsive metallosurfactants, and how to tune the properties of these metallosurfactants to respond to specific stimuli. The team also considers how to use these metallosurfactants to form responsive films on solid surfaces. This research is fundamental to concepts such as directional electron transport needed in quantum computing and stimuli-responsive materials. The outreach goals foster the dissemination of cutting edge scientific knowledge, graduate and undergraduate education and research, and the diffusion of scientific ideas to broader audiences. Professor Verani and collaborators are studying the synthesis, redox, electronic, and interfacial behavior of metallosurfactants, both in solution and as Langmuir-Blodgett monolayer films deposited onto electroactive surfaces. This interdisciplinary project aims to study the modulation of the Singly Occupied Molecular Orbital (SOMO)/Fermi gap on metallosurfactant films based on metal ions with distinct 3d0, 3d1, 3d2, 3d3, and 3d4 electronic configurations. The team also develops push/pull asymmetric metallosurfactants to study the relationship between orbital distortion and directional electron transport, and generates methodology to enable a new class of "on demand" ionic metallosurfactants obtained through the exchange of counterions by charged surfactants.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.