
First Functional Molecular Transistor Comes Alive - iiijjjiii
http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/12/functional-molecular-transistor
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graphene
I work in this field, and although it's nice to see some experimental progress
being made, I am generally sceptical of the potential of such devices as
transistors in the traditional sense. Firstly, the mantra that smaller is
better is not valid anymore at this scale, because of a number of reasons;
most prominently of which is that the electrodes which supply the charge
carriers are now (as in the picture in the article) much bigger than the
device itself, making further shrinking of the device itself useless.

Although the specific area of molecular electronics (meaning molecular
transistors) is vastly overhyped (and the Wired article doesn't help), I still
think there are incredible opportunities out there if we are able to harness
the electronic (meaning in this case, relating to electrons) properties of
molecular-scale systems. Examples could include designing our own catalysts,
pharmaceutical molecules, light-harvesting systems, or industrial materials
from scratch. Limiting the search for applications of these systems to the
traditional three-terminal electronic switching device, while making the
subject easier for laypeople to relate to, does a disservice to a whole
spectrum of other exciting other options.

~~~
Confusion
I don't have access to Nature anymore: does this transistor actually allow
_gain_? Or is this again one of the 'we made a transistor' claims where you
cannot possibly build any reasonable circuit out of the parts, because the
transistors have a gain < 1?

Having dealt with carbon nanotubes as part of my M.Sc. thesis, I miss a
comment on that and another major obstacle: can we properly manipulate and
align these components to structure circuits? We are still a long way from
that with nanotubes.

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graphene
About the gain: from the comments on other sites (I believe ars technica) I
seem to remember this was indeed the case, but I can't be sure.. (I don't have
access either from my holiday destination).

As for real circuit fabrication, you are absolutely right; I would even go so
far as to say that placing these individual molecules in some kind of circuit
topology is an order of magnitude harder than doing the same with CNTs. I
don't think they've even started working seriously on that problem yet, and I
wouldn't, either; you have to be able to make reasonable amounts of working
devices first...

