In order to realize molecular electronic devices, molecules with electrically interesting behavior must be identified. One molecule that has potential for use in devices is an oligo(phenylene ethynylene) (OPE) molecule with nitro sidegroup(s). These “nitro” molecules have been reported to show electrical switching with memory behavior, as well as negative differential resistance (NDR). However,...

Five heterobimetallic ReI/AuI and a tri-metallic ReI/AuI/ReI species following the formulas fac-[ReCl (CO)3(N^N^CAuR)]0/+ [(fac-[ReCl (CO)3(N^N^C)])2Au]+, where R is either iodide (1), phenylacetylene (2), dodecanethiol (3), 2,3,4,6-tetra-O-acetyl-1-thio-β-D-glucopyranose (4), JohnPhos (5) N^N^C fused imidazo[4,5-f]-1,10-phenanthroline heterotopic ligand, were synthesised fully characterised by...

The absorptive optical nonlinearity in nanoclusters of Au@hexanethiol and Au@dodecanethiol has been investigated. From the mass spectra, each cluster is estimated to contain about 140 atoms of gold. The optical absorption spectra of the clusters show a gradual increase in absorbance towards the UV region, over which an extremely weak surface plasmon resonance (SPR) is superposed. No plasmon ble...

Treatments with organic surfactants, followed by the deposition of nanocrystalline ceria coatings from aqueous solution, were applied to anodes of solid oxide fuel cells. The cells were then operated in hydrogen/nitrogen fuel streams with H2S contents ranging from 0 to 500 ppm. Two surfactant treatments were studied: immersion in dodecanethiol, and a multi-step conversion of a siloxy-anchored a...

The dimethyl ether steam reforming reaction to generate hydrogen was tested over 1 wt % Pd/Al2O3 catalysts prepared from different precursors. The conventional catalyst prepared by incipient wetness impregnation from palladium nitrate underwent strong deactivation under reforming conditions at 823 K because of metal sintering and carbon deposition. The same occurred over the catalyst prepared f...

A micromachined surface stress sensor has been fabricated and integrated off chip with a low-noise, differential capacitance, electronic readout circuit. The differential capacitance signal is modulated with a high frequency carrier signal, and the output signal is synchronously demodulated and filtered resulting in a dc output voltage proportional to the change in differential surface stress. ...

The design and the characterization of functionalized gold nanoparticles supracrystals require atomically resolved information on both the metallic core and the external organic ligand shell. At present, there is no known approach to characterize simultaneously the static local order of the ligands and of the nanoparticles, nor their dynamical evolution. In this work, we apply femtosecond small...