An electrically driven and readable molecular monolayer switch using a solid electrolyte

Abstract

The potential application of molecular switches as active elements in information storage has been demonstrated through numerous reported works. Importantly for devices, such switching capability has also been observed on self-assembled monolayers (SAMs). SAMs of electro-active molecules have been exploited in the last few years as electrochemical switches. Typically, the state of these switches could be read out through their optical and/or magnetic responses. These output reading processes are difficult to integrate into devices and in addition there is a need to use liquid environments to switch the redox-active molecular systems. Here, we overcome both these challenges using an ion-gel as electrolyte medium achieving an unprecedented solid state device based on a single molecular layer. Further, electrochemical impedance has been successfully exploited as the output of the system.