Detecting Individual Electrons Using a Carbon Nanotube Field-Effect Transistor

Abstract

We study a simple highly resistive molecular circuit by detecting the transfer of individual electrons. The circuit consists of a Au nanoparticle, a carbon nanotube transistor, and a gate electrode, and the tube−particle resistance is about 1019 Ω. The high-impedance measurements are carried out by counting the electrons that are transferred onto the particle using the nanotube transistor as the charge detector. These measurements allow for the electron characterization of the circuit. In addition, single-electron detection is used to determine the separation between the electron states in the particle or to monitor the decay in time of the electron number in the particle.