Functionalized Diamondoids and Their Electronic Properties for Field Emission

美国和德国的联合提案将有机化学和分子电子学结合在一起。最近发现的所谓钻石(纳米尺寸氢终止钻石)是理想的主题，因为它具有挑战性，而且非常有希望，因为它加入了两个原本不相关的科学小组和学科。从宏观钻石到纳米钻石的尺寸缩小的效果将通过a)制造功能衍生物(醇、硫醇、酸、胺、二烯等)来彻底检验，该功能衍生物允许纳米钻石附着在表面(Au、Al、Si等)。以及b)测量它们的电子性质。一个特别重要的特征是钻石类化合物的负电子亲和力，这将使它们成为大量应用的理想电子发射体。这两个方面也描述了贾斯图斯-利比格大学吉森和斯坦福大学加贝尔先进材料实验室两个小组之间的工作分配。没有一个小组可以单独解决我们提出的问题，因为需要大量的专业知识来提供适当的功能化碳氢化合物和高质量的分子电子测量。相互的工作得到了计算化学研究的补充，支持实验测量。关键词：烷基官能化、类金刚石、分子电子学、负电子亲和力材料。

The US-German joint proposal brings together organic chemistry with molecular electronics. The recently discovered class of so-called diamondoids (nanometer-sized hydrogen-terminated diamonds) is the ideal subject because it is challenging as well as highly promising and because it joins two otherwise unrelated scientific groups and disciplines. The effects in the reduction in size in going from macroscopic diamond to nanodiamonds will be thoroughly examined by a) making functional derivatives (alcohols, thiols, acids, amines, dienes, and others) that allows the attachment of the nanodiamonds to surfaces (Au, Al, Si etc.) and b) measuring their electronic properties. One particularly important feature is the proposed negative electron affinity of diamondoids that would make them ideal electron emitters for a large number of applications. These two aspects also describe the work distribution between the groups at the Justus-Liebig University Giessen and the Gabelle Lab for Advanced Materials at Stanford University. No group alone could tackle what we propose because significant expertise is required to provide appropriately functionalized hydrocarbons on one side and high-quality molecular electronics measurements on the other. The mutual work is complemented by computational chemistry studies supporting the experimental measurements. Keywords: alkane functionalization, diamondoids, molecular electronics, negative electron affinity materials.