The breakthrough is described as a significant step in attempts to reduce the circuitry size of electronic devices to the single molecule scale, and provide smaller, faster and more energy efficient electronics.
Hrvoje Petek, a professor of physics and chemistry at the School of Arts and Sciences at Pittsburgh, said that the project presents a template for assembling molecules over troughs that are only as wide as a single atom of copper.
The structures can be made to several times that length, matching wires currently used in computers and other devices.
These ultra-thin wires are one-dimensional, which may enable them to conduct electricity with minimal loss and thus improve the performance of an electronic device, according to Professor Petek.
The research centres on organic, carbon-based, ball-shaped carbon molecules known as fullerenes, but the method can serve as a template for creating the very tiny wires from a broad range of organic molecules.
Professor Petek explained that the merits of these wire-like structures can only be fully realised with organic molecules.
Materials used in contemporary electronics, such as silicon, are inorganic and cannot be miniaturised to be truly one-dimensional.
The findings were published today in the Journal of the American Chemical Society.
Engineers build 'wires' one molecule wide
By Robert Jaques on Oct 2, 2007 11:43AM