STM manipulation of a subphthalocyanine double-wheel molecule on Au(111)

Quantizing Chaplygin Hamiltonizable nonholonomic systems

In this article we develop a quantization procedure for Chaplygin Hamiltonizable nonholonomic systems—mechanical systems subject to non-integrable velocity constraints whose reduced mechanics is Hamiltonian after a suitable time reparametrization—using Poincaré transformations and geometric quantization. We illustrate the theory developed through examples and discuss potential applications to the study of the quantum mechanics of nanovehicles.

The Quantum Mechanics of a Rolling Molecular "Nanocar"

We formulate a mathematical model of a rolling “molecular wheelbarrow”—a two-wheeled nanoscale molecular machine—informed by experiments on molecular machines recently synthesized in labs. The model is a nonholonomic system (briefly, a system with non-integrable velocity constraints), for which no general quantization procedure exists. Nonetheless, we successfully embed the system in a Hamiltonian one and then quantize the result using geometric quantization and other tools; we extract from the result the quantum mechanics of the molecular wheelbarrow, and derive explicit formulae for the quantized energy spectrum. We also study a few variants of our model, some of which ignore the model’s nonholonomic constraints. We show that these variants have different quantum energy spectra, indicating that in such systems one should not ignore the nonholonomic constraints, since they alter in a non-trivial way the energy spectrum of the molecule.

From the Synthesis of Nanovehicles to Participation in the First Nanocar Race-View from the French Team

This review article presents our accomplished work on the synthesis of molecular triptycene wheels and their introduction into nanovehicles such as wheelbarrows and nanocars, equipped with two and four wheels, respectively. The architecture of nanovehicles is based on polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, which provide a potential cargo zone. Our strategy allowed us to obtain planar or curved nanocars, exhibiting different mobilities on metallic surfaces. Our curved nanocar participated in the first nanocar race organized in Toulouse (France) on 28 and 29 April 2017.

Atom-by-atom assembly

Atomic manipulation using a scanning tunneling microscope (STM) tip enables the construction of quantum structures on an atom-by-atom basis, as well as the investigation of the electronic and dynamical properties of individual atoms on a one-atom-at-a-time basis. An STM is not only an instrument that is used to 'see' individual atoms by means of imaging, but is also a tool that is used to 'touch' and 'take' the atoms, or to 'hear' their movements. Therefore, the STM can be considered as the 'eyes', 'hands' and 'ears' of the scientists, connecting our macroscopic world to the exciting atomic world. In this article, various STM atom manipulation schemes and their example applications are described. The future directions of atomic level assembly on surfaces using scanning probe tips are also discussed.

Single rotating molecule-machines: nanovehicles and molecular motors

In the last decade many molecular machines with controlled molecular motions have been synthesized. In the present review chapter we will present and discuss our contribution to the field, in particular through some examples of rotating molecular machines that have been designed, synthesized, and studied in our group. After starting by explaining why it is so important to study such machines as single molecules, we will focus on two families of molecular machines, nanovehicles and molecular motors. The first members of the nanovehicle family are molecules with two triptycenes as wheels: the axle and the wheelbarrow. Then come the four-wheel nanocars. Since triptycene wheels are not very mobile on metallic surfaces, alternative wheels with a bowl-shape structure have also been synthesized and studied on surfaces. The molecular motors are built around ruthenium organometallic centers and have a piano-stool geometry with peripheric ferrocenyl groups.