How Do Electronic Carriers Cross Si-Bound Alkyl Monolayers?

Electron transport through Si-C bound alkyl chains, sandwiched between and Hg, is characterized by two distinct types of barriers, each dominating in a different voltage range. At low voltage, the current depends strongly on temperature but not on molecular length, suggesting transport by thermionic emission over a barrier in the Si. At higher voltage, the current decreases exponentially with molecular length, suggesting transport limited by tunneling through the molecules. The tunnel barrier is estimated, from transport and photoemission data, to be approximately 1.5 eV with a 0.25m(e) effective mass.