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. 2008 Jan;8(1):345-9.
doi: 10.1021/nl073003j. Epub 2007 Dec 21.

Formation and self-breaking mechanism of stable atom-sized junctions

Makusu Tsutsui  1 , Kohei Shoji, Masateru Taniguchi, Tomoji Kawai
Affiliations

Formation and self-breaking mechanism of stable atom-sized junctions

Makusu Tsutsui et al. Nano Lett. 2008 Jan.

Abstract

The self-breaking mechanism of gold junctions is studied by investigating stability of the atom-sized contacts. The single atom contact lifetime increases from about 0.02 to 200 s upon decreasing the junction stretching speed, while at the same time, the breaking force diminishes logarithmically. We find that the junction self-breaking processes involve sufficient atomic rearrangements, which thereby allow complete self-compensation of externally introduced strain at 0.8 pm/s. The present results have important implications on fabrication of stable single molecule junctions.

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