Author Topic: Putting a molecule between two electrods  (Read 4530 times)

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Offline Emilio_bassini

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Putting a molecule between two electrods
« on: October 18, 2010, 01:17 »
Hi i'm new with atk and i'd like to know how i can put a molecule into a two-probe system...
i've got atk 2008 and 2010 too i 've just finished to build the Au electrods and i've a terthiophene molecule ready to be studied but i can't put it properly...
how can i do?


Offline Anders Blom

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Re: Putting a molecule between two electrods
« Reply #1 on: October 18, 2010, 08:57 »
Try the Custom builder called "Molecular Junction" :)
That is, click "Custom" then choose Molecular Junction from the "Builder" menu.
This is in 10.8, the version you will want to use!

Offline Emilio_bassini

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Re: Putting a molecule between two electrods
« Reply #2 on: October 19, 2010, 08:54 »
Thanks it works very well but when i try to plot the i-v curve i get a wrong one courrent is in fact about 4 uA with 2 V applied...how could i try to understand if the molecule is bounded to the electrods in the right way? And an other question if i put my molecule in the builder i see it as balls but where informations about the bonding between its atoms is stored?....what i mean is how can i be sure that those i see are sp3 sp2 sp C thanks

Offline Anders Blom

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Re: Putting a molecule between two electrods
« Reply #3 on: October 19, 2010, 11:45 »
As you may know "bonds" are not really physical. More to the point, ATK doesn't use bonds in the calculations. sp3 or sp2 hybridization is a useful picture when employing simpler models like tight-binding, but doesn't play any real role in DFT. In the Huckel model we do have different parameters for sp2 and sp3 hybridized carbon, for instance, but the bonds between atoms in the structure are still not used in the computational model.

Still, it's often useful to see bonds to get a better picture of the structure, and this will be included in the next version of ATK (11.2). But it will just be based on a geometric construction, using the covalent radius of each atom as a bonding criterion.

One way to see if the molecule hybridizes with the electrode would be to look at the electron density in the interface region. One could also compute the Mulliken overlap populations, but that's a bit harder.

4 microamp at 2 V sounds normal, why do you think it's wrong?

Offline Emilio_bassini

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Re: Putting a molecule between two electrods
« Reply #4 on: October 19, 2010, 18:00 »
Thank you so much you've been very helpfull now i got the right i-v courve...i said that 4 uA was insane because in an important paper aboud conduction of tiolated thiophene and i read a compleatly different value.
 for a Au-3TT-Au for a 2 volt bias we would reach about 12 uA.
I inserted a wrong adsorbation number and i 've inserted a wrong bonding angle now I set everything in a proper manner and all works