CHAPTER 10

Formation of Organic Nanostructures on Semiconductor Surfaces

MD. ZAKIR HOSSAIN AND MAKI KAWAI

10.1 INTRODUCTION

Single molecule or an assembly of organic molecules has the potential to be used as a basic component of future nanoscale electronic devices [1–3]. Indeed, a suitably functionalized ordered assembly of molecules on the surface can act as a wire, diode, transistor, and so on [4,5]. One of the key challenges for realization of such a device is assembling the functional organic molecules in a desired fashion and connecting them into a circuit. Among the various approaches for fabricating nanostructures on the material surface, the atom-by-atom manipulation with scanning tunneling microscope and the self-assembly of molecules are widely used [6–9]. However, these approaches are not suitable for semiconductor surface because the desired molecules are strongly bonded to the surface, and the molecular diffusion on the surface is greatly inhibited. Hence, the formation of organic nanostructures on semiconductor surfaces remains a challenging task.