title: Electrical manipulation of spin states in a single electrostatically gated transition-metal complex.
abstract: 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.
authors.affiliation: Kavli Institute of Nanoscience, Delft University of Technology, Lorentzweg 1, Delft, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Edgar A
authors.initials: EA
authors.lastname: Osorio
authors.forename: Kasper
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Moth-Poulsen
authors.forename: Herre S J
authors.initials: HS
authors.lastname: van der Zant
authors.forename: Jens
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Paaske
authors.forename: Per
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Hedegård
authors.forename: Karsten
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Flensberg
authors.forename: Jesper
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Bendix
authors.forename: Thomas
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Bjørnholm