Tuning the Conductance of Monatomic Carbon Chain

Ab initio calculations show that the conductance of short monatomic carbon chain can be dramatically modified by adhering a single H, N, or O atom to the chain. For example, the conductance of the pristine chain gets about two orders of magnitude smaller if an H atom is adhered to the chain. By a statistical model, the structure of the carbon chain with the single atom adhered is found to be quite stable at room temperature, indicating that the method can be used to tune the conductance of monatomic carbon chain.