Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Two-dimensional self-assembly of magic supramolecular clusters

1999; IOP Publishing; Volume: 11; Issue: 49 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1088/0953-8984/11/49/305

1361-648X

Matthias Böhringer, Karina Morgenstern, Wolf‐Dieter Schneider, Richard Berndt,

Molecular Junctions and Nanostructures

We report low-temperature scanning tunnelling microscope (STM) observations of magic two-dimensional supramolecular clusters formed after low-coverage deposition of 1-nitronaphthalene (NN) molecules on a reconstructed Au(111) substrate. The clusters that consist predominantly of ten NN molecules are chiral and form a racemic mixture on the surface. STM manipulation of the clusters shows that their internal structure does not depend on the atomistic details of the substrate. Manipulation of individual molecules within the clusters hints at utility for nanoscale devices. The enantiomers of these supramolecular clusters are discriminated and separated in a molecular-scale analogue to Pasteur's experiment.