News

We would like to draw your attention to a special talk by our guest Dr. Ashok Keerthi (University of Manchester, UK) that will take place on 4th of June at 14.00 in the lecture hall H18 (NWII) at the University of Bayreuth.

 "Synthetic Engineering of Graphene NanoRibbons – It’s All about Edges"

Graphene nanoribbons (GNRs) are considered to be quasi one dimensional (1D) polymeric systems. Their properties such as conductivity, charge mobility and magnetism depend greatly on their width, length and edge structure. Edge states in GNRs have undergone intense theoretical scrutiny, because their coherent spin manipulation would be a milestone for spintronic and quantum computing devices. However, experimental investigations are hampered by the fact that most nanoribbons do not have the required atomic control of the edges or functionality. A series of GNRs with different structures, e.g., size and edge configuration, as well as edge doping, have been synthesized, demonstrating the possibility of fine-tuning their optoelectronic, magnetic and supramolecular (self-assembly) properties through the structural modulation from bottom-up approaches. (ref 1-3) Inspired by these spectacular properties, GNR’s chemistry and physics has given a tremendous scope for next level development and applications in organic electronics, spintronic devices and quantum qubits. Recent developments and ongoing investigations on GNRs from our research group will be discussed.

References:

1. Slota, M.; Keerthi, A.; Myers, W. K.; Tretyakov, E.; Baumgarten, M.; Ardavan, A.; Sadeghi, H.; Lambert, C. J.; Narita, A.; Müllen, K.; Bogani, L., Magnetic edge states and coherent manipulation of graphene nanoribbons. Nature 2018, 557 (7707), 691-695.

2. Keerthi, A.; Radha, B.; Rizzo, D.; Lu, H.; Diez Cabanes, V.; Hou, I. C.-Y.; Beljonne, D.; Cornil, J.; Casiraghi, C.; Baumgarten, M.; Müllen, K.; Narita, A., Edge Functionalization of Structurally Defined Graphene Nanoribbons for Modulating the Self-Assembled Structures. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2017, 139 (46), 16454-16457.

3. Sharma, V.; Khan, H.; Walker, M.; Ahmad, H.; Thanai, A.; Marszalek, T.; Schollmeyer, D.; Baumgarten, M.; Evans, E. W.; Keerthi, A., Peri-alkylated terrylenes and ternaphthalenes building-blocks towards multi-edge nanographenes. Chem. Eur. J. 2024, e202401462 (https://chemistry-europe.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/chem.202401462).