Electrical manipulation of spin states in a single electrostatically gated transition-metal complex.
We demonstrate an electrically controlled high-spin (S = 5/2) to low-spin (S = 1/2) transition in a three-terminal device incorporating a single Mn(2+) ion coordinated by two terpyridine ligands. By adjusting the gate-voltage we reduce the terpyridine moiety and thereby strengthen the ligand-field on the Mn-atom. Adding a single electron thus stabilizes the low-spin configuration and the corresponding sequential tunnelling current is suppressed by spin-blockade. From low-temperature inelastic cotunneling spectroscopy, we infer the magnetic excitation spectrum of the molecule and uncover also a strongly gate-dependent singlet-triplet splitting on the low-spin side. The measured bias-spectroscopy is shown to be consistent with an exact diagonalization of the Mn-complex, and an interpretation of the data is given in terms of a simplified effective model.
Osorio
Edgar A
EA
Kavli Institute of Nanoscience, Delft University of Technology, Lorentzweg 1, Delft, The Netherlands.
Moth-Poulsen
Kasper
K
van der Zant
Herre S J
HS
Paaske
Jens
J
Hedegård
Per
P
Flensberg
Karsten
K
Bendix
Jesper
J
Bjørnholm
Thomas
T