19/05/2020
We present a thorough and comprehensive analysis of charge transport properties at solid-state protein junctions across different research groups. Various junction platforms and device configurations have been systematically evaluated, which have been found to play a critical role in determining the metal-molecules (protein) coupling efficiency at the bio-hybrid interface (in terms of contact resistance) and significantly influence the measured current densities, thus implying the importance of contact design and quality in molecular junction studies. Temperature-dependent transport measurements indicate that the charge transport mechanism is quite consistent between different junction geometries/measurement platforms (dominated by tunneling). Our conclusions are based on the unprecedented set of molecular electronic data of biomolecular tunnel junctions, which would be extremely helpful in addressing the ambiguity and discrepancy in the field, and provide important insight and guidance in optimizing the contact design/fabrication to accommodate the interfacial structural and thermodynamic mismatches, to facilitate biological charge transport studies.
Successful integration of proteins in solid-state electronics requires contacting them in a non-invasive fashion, with a solid conducting surface for …
