Fragmenting gadolinium: Mononuclear polyoxometalate-based magnetic coolers for ultra-low temperatures
The polyoxometalate clusters with formula [Gd(W 5O 18) 2] 9- and [Gd(P 5W 30O 110)] 12- each carry a single magnetic ion of gadolinium, which is the most widespread element among magnetic refrigerant materials. In an adiabatic demagnetization, the lowest attainable temperature is limited by the presence of magnetic interactions that bring about magnetic order below a critical temperature. We demonstrate that this limitation can be overcome by chemically engineering the molecules in such a way to effectively screen all magnetic interactions, suggesting their use as ultra-low-temperature coolers. © 2012 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.
Polymer‐Based Composites for Engineering Organic Memristive Devices
Memristive materials are related to neuromorphic applications as they can combine information processing with memory storage in a single computational element, just as biological neurons. Many of these bioinspired materials emulate the characteristics of memory and learning processes that happen in the brain. In this work, we report the memristive properties of a two-terminal (2-T) organic device based on ionic migration mediated by an ion-transport polymer. The material possesses unique memristive properties: it is reversibly switchable, shows tens of conductive states, presents Hebbian learning demonstrated by spiking time dependent plasticity (STDP), and behaves with both short- (STM) an…
Proposal for a Dual Spin Filter Based on [VO(C 3 S 4 O) 2 ] 2–
Polynuclear magnetic molecules often present dense electronic transmission spectra with many overlapping conduction spin channels. Single-metal complexes display a sparser density of states, which in the presence of a fixed external magnetic field makes them interesting candidates for spin filtering. Here we perform a DFT study of a family of bis- and tris-dithiolate vanadium complexes sandwiched between Au(111) electrodes and demonstrate that [VO(C3S4O)2]2– can behave as a dual spin filter. This means that an external electrical stimulus can switch between the selective transmission of spin-up and spin-down carriers. By using an electrostatic gate, we show that the onset for the spin-up co…
Parallel implementation of the MAGPACK package for the analysis of high-nuclearity spin clusters
Abstract Molecular clusters are formed by a finite number of exchange-coupled paramagnetic centers and they are model systems between molecules and extended solids. In order to simulate their properties and extrapolate to solids, the size of the systems to be treated should be as large as possible. In this context, the use of efficient parallel codes is essential. We present the parallel programs ParAni and ParIso , for anisotropic and isotropic models, that enable the calculation of large energy matrices in parallel and the subsequent computation of the relevant spectral information. The evaluation of the matrix elements is based on the serial package Magpack that uses the irreducible tens…
Design of Magnetic Polyoxometalates for Molecular Spintronics and as Spin Qubits
Abstract In the past decades, POMs have been used as minimal models in Molecular Magnetism, since they are a convenient playing ground to study fundamental phenomena such as anisotropic magnetic exchange and electron transfer. Now they have jumped to the stage of the rational design of single-ion magnets and are being considered as test subjects for simple experiments in Single-Molecule Spintronics and Molecular Quantum Computing. This chapter contains an overview of recent results that demonstrate the potential of POMs in these emerging fields.
Single ion magnets based on lanthanoid polyoxomolybdate complexes
Polyoxometalate (POM) chemistry has recently offered excellent examples of single ion magnets (SIMs) and molecular spin qubits. Compared with conventional coordination compounds, POMs provide rigid and highly symmetric coordination sites. However, all POM-based SIMs reported to date exhibit a very limited range of possibilities for chemical processability. We present herein two new families of POM-based SIMs which are soluble in organic solvents: [Ln(β-Mo8O26)2]5− {LnIII = Tb, Dy, Ho, Er, Tm and Yb} and the functionalised POMs [Ln{Mo5O13(OMe)4NNC6H4-p-NO2}2]3− {LnIII = Tb, Dy, Ho, Er, Yb and Nd}. In addition, these two families represent the first SIMs based on polyoxomolybdates. A magneto-…
The Use of Polyoxometalates in the Design of Layer‐Like Hybrid Salts Containing Cationic Mn 4 Single‐Molecule Magnets
Herein, we describe the combination of polyoxometalates (POMs) with a polynuclear metallic cluster Mn4 {Mn4 = [Mn4(OAc)2(pdmH)6]2+, (pdmH = deprotonated pyridine-2,6-dimethanol; C7H8NO2)} for the construction of ionic crystals with layered architectures. Choosing a POM with the appropriate charge and size not only allows for the fine tuning of the stacking periodicity, but it also allows modifying the in-plane packing motif and density of the cationic metallic clusters. The isolation of differently layered hybrid crystals with the same Mn4 single-molecule-magnet (SMM) system allowed for the direct comparison of the magnetic properties of such materials. The variation of the slow relaxation …
SIMPRE: A software package to calculate crystal field parameters, energy levels, and magnetic properties on mononuclear lanthanoid complexes based on charge distributions
This work presents a fortran77 code based on an effective electrostatic model of point charges around a rare earth ion. The program calculates the full set of crystal field parameters, energy levels spectrum, and wave functions, as well as the magnetic properties such as the magnetization, the temperature dependence of the magnetic susceptibility, and the Schottky contribution to the specific heat. It is designed for real systems that need not bear ideal symmetry and it is able to determine the easy axis of magnetization. Its systematic application to different coordination environments allows magneto-structural studies. The package has already been successfully applied to several mononucle…
Deciphering the Role of Dipolar Interactions in Magnetic Layered Double Hydroxides
Layered double hydroxides (LDHs) exhibit unparalleled anion exchange properties and the ability to be exfoliated into 2D nanosheets, which can be used as a building block to fabricate a wide variety of hybrid functional nanostructured materials. Still, if one wants to use LDHs as a magnetic building blocks in the design of complex architectures, the role played by the dipolar magnetic interactions in these layered materials needs to be understood. In this work, we synthesized and characterized a five-membered CoAl-LDH series with basal spacing ranging from 7.5 to 34 Å. A detailed experimental characterization allows us to conclude that the main factor governing the dipolar interactions betw…
Towards peptide-based tunable multistate memristive materials
Development of new memristive hardware is a technological requirement towards widespread neuromorphic computing. Molecular spintronics seems to be a fertile field for the design and preparation of this hardware. Within molecular spintronics, recent results on metallopeptides demonstrating the interaction between paramagnetic ions and the chirality induced spin selectivity effect hold particular promise for developing fast (ns–μs) operation times. [R. Torres-Cavanillas et al., J. Am. Chem. Soc., 2020, DOI: 10.1021/jacs.0c07531]. Among the challenges in the field, a major highlight is the difficulty in modelling the spin dynamics in these complex systems, but at the same time the use of inexp…
Vanadyl dithiolate single molecule transistors: the next spintronic frontier?
The role of Chemistry in the road towards quantum devices is the design of elementary pieces with a built-in function. A brilliant example is the use of molecular transistors as nuclear spin detectors, which, up to now, has been implemented only on [TbPc$_2$]$^-$. We argue that this is an artificial constraint and critically discuss the limitations of current theoretical approaches to assess the potential of molecules for their use in spintronics. In connection with this, we review the recent progress in the preparation of highly coherent spin qubits based on vanadium dithiolate complexes and argue that the use of vanadyl dithiolates as single molecule transistors to read and control a trip…
Peptides as Versatile Platforms for Quantum Computing
The pursuit of novel functional building blocks for the emerging field of quantum computing is one of the most appealing topics in the context of quantum technologies. Herein we showcase the urgency of introducing peptides as versatile platforms for quantum computing. In particular, we focus on lanthanide-binding tags, originally developed for the study of protein structure. We use pulsed electronic paramagnetic resonance to demonstrate quantum coherent oscillations in both neodymium and gadolinium peptidic qubits. Calculations based on density functional theory followed by a ligand field analysis indicate the possibility of influencing the nature of the spin qubit states by means of contro…
Coherence and organisation in lanthanoid complexes: from single ion magnets to spin qubits
Molecular magnetism is reaching a degree of development that will allow for the rational design of sophisticated systems. Among these, here we will focus on those that display single-molecule magnetic behaviour, i.e. classical memories, and on magnetic molecules that can be used as molecular spin qubits, the irreducible components of any quantum technology. Compared with candidates developed from physics, a major advantage of molecular spin qubits stems from the power of chemistry for the tailored and inexpensive synthesis of new systems for their experimental study; in particular, the so-called lanthanoid-based single-ion magnets, which have for a long time been one of the hottest topics i…
Rational Design of Single-Ion Magnets and Spin Qubits Based on Mononuclear Lanthanoid Complexes
Here we develop a general approach to calculating the energy spectrum and the wave functions of the low-lying magnetic levels of a lanthanoid ion submitted to the crystal field created by the surrounding ligands. This model allows us to propose general criteria for the rational design of new mononuclear lanthanoid complexes behaving as single-molecule magnets (SMMs) or acting as robust spin qubits. Three typical environments exhibited by these metal complexes are considered, namely, (a) square antiprism, (b) triangular dodecahedron, and (c) trigonal prism. The developed model is used to explain the properties of some representative examples showing these geometries. Key questions in this ar…
Exploiting Clock Transitions for the chemical design of resilient molecular spin qubits
Molecular spin qubits are chemical nanoobjects with promising applications that are so far hampered by the rapid loss of quantum information, a process known as decoherence. A strategy to improve this situation involves employing so-called Clock Transitions (CTs), which arise at anticrossings between spin energy levels. At CTs, the spin states are protected from magnetic noise and present an enhanced quantum coherence. Unfortunately, these optimal points are intrinsically hard to control since their transition energy cannot be tuned by an external magnetic field; moreover, their resilience towards geometric distortions has not yet been analyzed. Here we employ a python-based computational t…
Modelling electric field control of the spin state in the mixed-valence polyoxometalate [GeV14O40]8−
International audience; : The two-electron reduced mixed-valence polyoxometalate [GeV14O40](8-) presents an unusual paramagnetic behaviour as a consequence of the partial trapping of these electrons. The effect of applying an electric field is that of inducing antiferromagnetic coupling between the two delocalized electronic spins.
Multi-frequency EPR studies of a mononuclear holmium single-molecule magnet based on the polyoxometalate [Ho(III)(W5O18)2]9-.
Continuous-wave, multi-frequency electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) studies are reported for a series of single-crystal and powder samples containing different dilutions of a recently discovered mononuclear Ho(III) (4f(10)) single-molecule magnet (SMM) encapsulated in a highly symmetric polyoxometalate (POM) cage. The encapsulation offers the potential for applications in molecular spintronics devices, as it preserves the intrinsic properties of the nanomagnet outside of the crystal. A significant magnetic anisotropy arises due to a splitting of the Hund's coupled total angular momentum (J = L + S = 8) ground state in the POM ligand field. Thus, high-frequency (50.4 GHz) EPR studies reve…
Reinforced Room-Temperature Spin Filtering in Chiral Paramagnetic Metallopeptides
Chirality-induced spin selectivity (CISS), whereby helical molecules polarize the spin of electrical current, is an intriguing effect with potential applications in nanospintronics. In this nascent field, the study of the CISS effect using paramagnetic chiral molecules, which could introduce another degree of freedom in controlling the spin transport, remains so far unexplored. To address this challenge, herein we propose the use of self-assembled monolayers (SAMs) of helical lanthanide-binding peptides. To elucidate the effect of the paramagnetic nuclei, monolayers of the peptide coordinating paramagnetic or diamagnetic ions are prepared. By means of spin-dependent electrochemistry, the CI…
Spin-crossover iron(ii) complex showing thermal hysteresis around room temperature with symmetry breaking and an unusually high T(LIESST) of 120 K.
We report a Fe(II) complex based on 4′,4′′ carboxylic acid disubstituted dipyrazolylpyridine that shows a spin-crossover close to room temperature associated to a crystallographic phase transition and the LIESST effect with a high T(LIESST) of 120 K.
Magneto-structural correlations and DFT calculations in two rare tetranuclear copper(II)-clusters with doubly phenoxo and end-on azido bridges: Syntheses, structural variations and EPR studies
International audience; By slightly changing the synthetic conditions, we have prepared two closely related linear tetranuclear CuII complexes with the symmetrical ONNO donor tetradentate Schiff-base ligand [H2L = (OH)C6H4(CH3)Cdouble bond; length as m-dashN(CH2)3Ndouble bond; length as m-dashC(CH3)C6H4(OH)] and with azide ions. These two distinctly coloured crystalline products were characterized by elemental analysis, IR and UV–Vis spectroscopy, CV, EPR spectra and variable temperature magnetic measurements. Single crystal X-ray diffraction studies of the green [Cu4(μ-L)2(μ1,1-N3)2(N3)2] (1) and the red [Cu4(μ-L)2(μ1,1-N3)2(N3)2(H2O)2] (2) crystals show that the coordination environment o…
Exploring the transport properties of equatorially low coordinated erbium single ion magnets
Single-molecule spin transport represents the lower limit of miniaturization of spintronic devices. These experiments, although extremely challenging, are key to understand the magneto-electronic properties of a molecule in a junction. In this context, theoretical screening of new magnetic molecules provides invaluable knowledge before carrying out sophisticated experiments. Herein, we investigate the transport properties of three equatorially low-coordinated erbium single ion magnets with C3v symmetry: Er[N(SiMe3)2]3 (1), Er(btmsm)3 (2) and Er(dbpc)3 (3), where btmsm=bis(trimethylsilyl)methyl and dbpc=2,6-di-tert-butyl-p-cresolate. Our ligand field analysis, based on previous spectros…
Self-assembly of an iron(ii)-based M5L6 metallosupramolecular cage
A pentanuclear M(5)L(6) coordination cage is self-assembled in solution from a rigid linear heteroditopic phen-tpy ligand and an iron (II) salt.
Modeling the properties of uranium-based single ion magnets
We analyze the magnetic behavior of the five uranium-based SIMs reported in the literature. By combining a corrected crystal field model with the magnetic experimental data, we obtain the lowest-lying magnetic levels and the associated wave functions of the nanomagnets, which are found to be compatible with the observed SMM behavior. Additionally, this approach has allowed us to propose some geometrical considerations and practical advice for experimentalists aiming for the rational design of SIMs and spin qubits based on uranium.
Mononuclear lanthanide single molecule magnets based on the polyoxometalates [Ln(W5O18)2]9- and [Ln(beta2-SiW11O39)2]13- (Ln(III) = Tb, Dy, Ho, Er, Tm, and Yb).
The first two families of polyoxometalate-based single-molecule magnets (SMMs) are reported here. Compounds of the general formula [Ln(W(5)O(18))(2)](9-) (Ln(III) = Tb, Dy, Ho, and Er) and [Ln(SiW(11)O(39))(2)](13-) (Ln(III) = Tb, Dy, Ho, Er, Tm, and Yb) have been magnetically characterized with static and dynamic measurements. Slow relaxation of the magnetization, typically associated with SMM-like behavior, was observed for [Ln(W(5)O(18))(2)](9-) (Ln(III) = Ho and Er) and [Ln(SiW(11)O(39))(2)](13-) (Ln(III) = Dy, Ho, Er, and Yb). Among them, only the [Er(W(5)O(18))(2)](9-) derivative exhibited such a behavior above 2 K with an energy barrier for the reversal of the magnetization of 55 K. …
SIMPRE1.2: Considering the hyperfine and quadrupolar couplings and the nuclear spin bath decoherence
SIMPRE is a fortran77code which uses an effective electrostatic model of point charges to predict the magnetic behavior of rare-earth-based mononuclear complexes. In this manuscript, we present SIMPRE1.2, which now takes into account two further phenomena.Firstly, SIMPRE now considers the hyperfine and quadrupolar interactions within the rare-earth ion, resulting in a more complete and realistic set of energy levels and wave functions. Secondly,and in order to widen SIMPRE’s predictive capabilities regarding potential molecular spin qubits, it now includes a routine that calculates an upper-bound estimate of the decoherence time considering only the dipolar coupling between the electron spi…
Theoretical insights on the importance of anchoring vs molecular geometry in magnetic molecules acting as junctions
The anchoring of the molecule to an electrode is known to be a key factor in single-molecule spintronics experiments. Likewise, a relaxation down to the most stable geometry is a critical step in theoretical simulations of transport through single-molecule junctions. Herein we present a set of calculations designed to analyze and compare the effect of different anchoring points and the effect of perturbations in the molecular geometry and interelectrode distance. As model system we chose the [V($\alpha$-C$_3$S$_5$)$_3$]$^{2-}$ complex connecting two Au(111) electrodes in a slightly compressed geometry. In our calculations, the attachment happens through an S-Au bond, a common anchoring stra…
Electrically switchable magnetic molecules: inducing a magnetic coupling by means of an external electric field in a mixed-valence polyoxovanadate cluster.
International audience; Herein we evaluate the influence of an electric field on the coupling of two delocalized electrons in the mixed-valence polyoxometalate (POM) [GeV14 O40 ](8-) (in short V14 ) by using both a t-J model Hamiltonian and DFT calculations. In absence of an electric field the compound is paramagnetic, because the two electrons are localized on different parts of the POM. When an electric field is applied, an abrupt change of the magnetic coupling between the two delocalized electrons can be induced. Indeed, the field forces the two electrons to localize on nearest-neighbors metal centers, leading to a very strong antiferromagnetic coupling. Both theoretical approaches have…
Spin-crossover nanoparticles anchored on MoS2 layers for heterostructures with tunable strain driven by thermal or light-induced spin switching
In the past few years, the effect of strain on the optical and electronic properties of MoS2 layers has attracted particular attention as it can improve the performance of optoelectronic and spintronic devices. Although several approaches have been explored, strain is typically externally applied on the two-dimensional material. In this work, we describe the preparation of a reversible ‘self-strainable’ system in which the strain is generated at the molecular level by one component of a MoS2-based composite material. Spin-crossover nanoparticles were covalently grafted onto functionalized layers of semiconducting MoS2 to form a hybrid heterostructure. Their ability to switch between two spi…
Quantum Error Correction with magnetic molecules
Quantum algorithms often assume independent spin qubits to produce trivial $|\uparrow\rangle=|0\rangle$, $|\downarrow\rangle=|1\rangle$ mappings. This can be unrealistic in many solid-state implementations with sizeable magnetic interactions. Here we show that the lower part of the spectrum of a molecule containing three exchange-coupled metal ions with $S=1/2$ and $I=1/2$ is equivalent to nine electron-nuclear qubits. We derive the relation between spin states and qubit states in reasonable parameter ranges for the rare earth $^{159}$Tb$^{3+}$ and for the transition metal Cu$^{2+}$, and study the possibility to implement Shor's Quantum Error Correction code on such a molecule. We also disc…
Electric Field Generation and Control of Bipartite Quantum Entanglement between Electronic Spins in Mixed Valence Polyoxovanadate [GeV14O40]8–
As part of the search for systems in which control of quantum entanglement can be achieved, here we consider the paramagnetic mixed valence polyoxometalate K2Na6[GeV14O40]·10H2O in which two electrons are delocalized over the 14 vanadium ions. Applying a homogeneous electric field can induce an antiferromagnetic coupling between the two delocalized electronic spins that behave independently in the absence of the field. On the basis of the proposed theoretical model, we show that the external field can be used to generate controllable quantum entanglement between the two electronic spins traveling over a vanadium network of mixed valence polyoxoanion [GeV14O40]8–. Within a simplified two-lev…