Skip to content
DraconiticResearch
Search Sources API
201,818 studies31 sourcesUpdated 53 min ago
PreprintCC BYChemRxiv

Incoherent Transport Signatures in Ferrocene and Ferrocenium-based Molecular Wires

  • Linlin Hou1
  • Varshini Kumar2
  • Munirah Alsaqer3
  • Amit Sil1
  • James M. F. Morris1
  • Chongguang Liu1
  • Xiaohang Qiao1
  • Adam Larbi1
  • Abdalghani Daaoub3
  • Stephen Moggach2
  • Sara Sangtarash3
  • Richard Nichols1
3 more authors
  • Hatef Sadeghi3
  • Paul Low2
  • Andrea Vezzoli1
  1. 1University of Liverpool
  2. 2University of Western Australia
  3. 3University of Warwick
Open at sourcePDFDOICite

Abstract

Molecular wires incorporating redox units are foundational to single-molecule electronics, yet the molecular designs and environment which govern whether charge-transport proceeds predominantly via phase-coherent quantum tunnelling or thermally activated incoherent hopping remains debated. By synthesising bench-stable Fe(III) ferrocenium wires ( ex-situ oxidation) and comparing their molecular conductance against electrochemically gated Fe(II) analogues ( in-situ oxidation) within scanning tunnelling microscopy break-junctions, we identify distinct experimental signatures of coexisting transport regimes. For both ferrocene and ferrocenium systems, while phase-coherent tunnelling through frontier molecular orbitals dominates at low bias, favourable environmental reorganisation energetics trigger efficient, two-step sequential processes at high biases. These findings resolve a long-standing mechanistic question in metallocene molecular electronics and highlight how two-terminal measurements alone are insufficient to resolve such ambiguities. Our combined electrochemical approach provides a pathway to more robust characterisation of transport phenomena in molecular junctions.

Related

  1. (ImRN)2Fe: An Elusive Complex and the Limits of Its Ferrocene Analogy
    Manuel Saucedo, Alejandra Gomez-Torres, Iván E. Arvizo +4
    ChemRxivPreprintCC BYFull textOrganic chemistryChemRxiv
  2. Electrochemical Fluorescence Switching in Rhodamine-Ferrocene Dyads: Spatiotemporal Control in Biomimetic Membranes
    Ning Jiang, Lorenzo Meneghelli, Niccolo Dipace +13
    Journal of the American Chemical SocietyPeer-reviewedCC BY 4.0Full textInorganic & organometallic chemistryTheoretical & computational chemistryHAL
  3. π-Interaction-Guided Tuning of Ferrocene Redox Mediators for Shono-Type Allylation of N-Aryl Amines
    Yahui Guo, Siyuan Su, Lupita S. Ramirez +3
    ChemRxivPreprintCC BY-NC-NDFull textOrganic chemistryChemRxiv
  4. Panchromatic photochromic push–pull dyes featuring a ferrocene donor group
    Diego Mirani, Antonio Riquelme, Samuel Fauvel +4
    Materials Chemistry FrontiersPeer-reviewedCC BY-NCFull text5 citedMaterials & polymersHAL
  5. Molecular Diagnostic Biomarkers in Autism Spectrum Disorder: From Multi-Omics Signatures to Precision Therapeutic Targets
    Yanghao Zheng, Mingzhe Zhao
    MoleculesPeer-reviewedCC BY 4.0General chemistryCrossref

Cite

BibTeXRIS
BibTeX
@misc{hou2026incoherent,
  title = {{Incoherent Transport Signatures in Ferrocene and Ferrocenium-based Molecular Wires}},
  author = {Linlin Hou and Varshini Kumar and Munirah Alsaqer and Amit Sil and James M. F. Morris and Chongguang Liu and Xiaohang Qiao and Adam Larbi and Abdalghani Daaoub and Stephen Moggach and Sara Sangtarash and Richard Nichols and Hatef Sadeghi and Paul Low and Andrea Vezzoli},
  howpublished = {ChemRxiv},
  year = {2026},
  month = sep,
  doi = {10.26434/chemrxiv-2025-24d4d/v2},
  url = {https://chemrxiv.org/doi/full/10.26434/chemrxiv-2025-24d4d/v2},
  note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY  - UNPB
TI  - Incoherent Transport Signatures in Ferrocene and Ferrocenium-based Molecular Wires
AU  - Linlin Hou
AU  - Varshini Kumar
AU  - Munirah Alsaqer
AU  - Amit Sil
AU  - James M. F. Morris
AU  - Chongguang Liu
AU  - Xiaohang Qiao
AU  - Adam Larbi
AU  - Abdalghani Daaoub
AU  - Stephen Moggach
AU  - Sara Sangtarash
AU  - Richard Nichols
AU  - Hatef Sadeghi
AU  - Paul Low
AU  - Andrea Vezzoli
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/09/21
PB  - ChemRxiv
DO  - 10.26434/chemrxiv-2025-24d4d/v2
UR  - https://chemrxiv.org/doi/full/10.26434/chemrxiv-2025-24d4d/v2
AB  - Molecular wires incorporating redox units are foundational to single-molecule electronics, yet the molecular designs and environment which govern whether charge-transport proceeds predominantly via phase-coherent quantum tunnelling or thermally activated incoherent hopping remains debated. By synthesising bench-stable Fe(III) ferrocenium wires ( ex-situ oxidation) and comparing their molecular conductance against electrochemically gated Fe(II) analogues ( in-situ oxidation) within scanning tunnelling microscopy break-junctions, we identify distinct experimental signatures of coexisting transport regimes. For both ferrocene and ferrocenium systems, while phase-coherent tunnelling through frontier molecular orbitals dominates at low bias, favourable environmental reorganisation energetics trigger efficient, two-step sequential processes at high biases. These findings resolve a long-standing mechanistic question in metallocene molecular electronics and highlight how two-terminal measurements alone are insufficient to resolve such ambiguities. Our combined electrochemical approach provides a pathway to more robust characterisation of transport phenomena in molecular junctions.
ER  -