Electronic properties of single Prussian Blue Analog nanocrystals determined by conductive-AFM

We report a study of the electron transport (ET) properties at the nanoscale (conductive-AFM denoted as C-AFM hereafter) of individual Prussian Blue Analog (PBA) cubic nanocrystals (NCs) of CsCoIIIFeII, with a size between 15 and 50 nm deposited on HOPG. We demonstrate that these PBA NCs feature an almost size-independent electron injection barrier of 0.41 +/- 0.02 eV and 0.27 +/- 0.03 eV at the CsCoIIIFeII/HOPG and CsCoIIIFeII/C-AFM tip, respectively, and an intrinsic electron conductivity evolving from a large dispersion between similar to 5 x 10-4 and 2 x 10-2 S cm-1 without a clear correlation with the nanocrystal size. The conductivity values measured on individual nanocrystals are up to fifty times higher than those reported on PBA films. We report a study of the electron transport (ET) properties at the nanoscale (conductive-AFM denoted as C-AFM hereafter) of individual Prussian Blue Analog (PBA) cubic nanocrystals (NCs) of CsCoIIIFeII, with a size between 15 and 50 nm deposited on HOPG.

Automated summary

This study investigates the electron transport properties between Prussian Blue Analog (PBA) cubic nanocrystals and graphene. It reveals that these nanocrystals exhibit unique characteristics in terms of almost size-independent electron injection barrier and significantly enhanced conductivity compared to PBA films.