16.3 Manipulation and Characterization of Molecular Scale Components

The last decade has witnessed several remarkable advances in the field of molecular electronics. Custom synthesized molecules have been shown to exhibit useful electronic functions such as switching and memory. Carbon nanotubes (CNTs), with a diameter as small as 1 nm, have shown transistor-like properties. Meanwhile, the molecular recognition properties of DNA have been exploited to facilitate the self-assembly of nanoscale structures. Not surprisingly, molecular electronics was named “the breakthrough of the year ” by Science Magazine in 2001. The unique potential of molecular electronics is the “bottom-up” self-assembly of inherently small objects such as molecules into devices and circuits. This represents a paradigm shift compared to the semiconductor “top-down ” approach. Furthermore, the simplicity of this approach also offers significant economic edge over the conventional approach in which the escalating costs o