Potential of directed- and self-assembled molecular nanowires for optoelectronic functional devices

A variety of applications of molecular nanowires is reviewed in the first part of this article. First of all, growth techniques of molecular nanowires are discussed in terms of directed- and self-assemblies. Subsequently, various kinds of functional devices, e.g., field-effect transistors, memory devices, data storage, photo-electric conversion devices, are described. These devices have been proposed by taking advantages of one-dimensional structures and a wide range of molecular functions. In the second part of this article, we demonstrate our recent work. The main purposes are to provide a guideline on molecular design for growing of one-dimensional nanowires and to discuss their optical and electronic properties. A specific stress is laid on multi-level transistor operation as an evidence of effective utilization of one-dimensional nanowires. Although these performances are still preliminary, our results demonstrate a strong possibility of molecular nanowires as components in novel molecular devices.