Surface-confined polymerization on semiconducting and insulating substrates

我已经概述了一个研究半导体和氧化物表面上自组织二维(2D)聚合物的形成、结构和电子性质的实验计划。**现在可以将原子和分子排列成只有几个纳米大小的结构(一纳米大约是四个原子的直径，或人类头发的五万分之一)。合成的结构通常代表具有独特性质的新材料。一种特别吸引人的方法是利用自组织方法，而不是“一次一个原子”地制造这些设备。自组织的特征是在纳米尺度上自发形成有序的表面结构。我们将与莱克黑德大学的学生一起研究二维有机聚合物在半导体和氧化物表面的自组织。**作为这项提议的一部分，我们概述了一系列实验，通过表面限制聚合来创建二维共轭聚合物。传统的聚合反应产生一维的聚合物链。通过在原子平面上诱导聚合，我们希望在二维内得到具有高度有序度和电子共轭的聚合物。我们期待得到的聚合物将在电子和纳米技术中表现出独特的性能和广泛的应用。**我们将利用扫描隧道显微镜(STM)来研究得到的聚合物的主要实验技术。扫描隧道显微镜可以在原子长度尺度上成像和测量表面的电子性质。由于能够“看到”单个原子，STM已被证明是纳米科学中一种非常有价值的工具。**如上所述，该计划的目标是研究半导体和氧化物表面的表面约束聚合。到目前为止，实验只在单晶金属表面上进行。我预计，在这项提案中概述的目标方面的进展将有助于开发一类具有独特性质并在电子、光学和传感器技术中广泛应用的新型有机材料。

I have outlined an experimental program to study the formation, structure, and electronic properties of self-organized two-dimensional (2-d) polymers on semiconducting and oxide surfaces.** It is now possible to arrange atoms and molecules into structures only a few nanometers in size (one nanometer is the diameter of about of four atoms, or 1/50,000th of a human hair). The resultant structures often represent new materials with unique properties. Rather than building these devices "one atom at a time", a particularly attractive approach is to utilize a self-organization approach. Self-organization is characterized by the spontaneous formation of organized surface structures at nanometre length scales. With students at Lakehead University we will study the self-organization of two-dimensional organic polymers at semiconducting and oxide surfaces.** As part of this proposal we outline a series of experiments to create polymers with conjugation in two dimensions via surface-confined polymerization. Traditional polymerization produces one-dimensional polymer chains. By inducing polymerization on an atomically flat surface we hope to produce polymers with a high degree of order and electronic conjugation in 2-d. We expect the resultant polymers will exhibit unique properties with wide-ranging applications in electronics and nanotechnology.** The primary experimental technique we will utilize to study of the resulting polymers is scanning tunneling microscopy (STM). STM can image and measure the electronic properties of surfaces at atomic length scales. With the ability to "see" individual atoms STM has proven to be an extremely valuable tool in nanoscience.** As stated the goal of this program is to study surface confined polymerization at semiconducting and oxide surfaces. To date experiments have been performed exclusively on single crystal metal surfaces. I anticipate that progress on the objectives outlined in this proposal will contribute to the development of a new class of organic materials with unique properties and wide ranging application in electronic, optics, and sensor technology.