Nacho Pascual

Nanoscience Cooperative Research Center, CIC-Nanogune, San Sebastián, Spain

Abstract

Title: STM and nc-AFM for single molecule imaging, spectroscopy and manipulation

The development of scanning tunneling spectroscopy at low temperatures during the last decades facilitated the access to a large variety of fundamental phenomena in individual atoms and molecules, magnetism, optics, chemistry,…. many of which were unexpected years ago. Tunneling electrons probe electronic density of states in an elastic and coherent manner. But they also are highly controllable a source of incoherent excitations, exchanging energy, and angular momenta with the states of an atom/molecule/surface. Attachment of a STM tip to a mechanical resonator allows measurement of forces of a few PN with sub-Angstrong resolution.
In this brief seminar I will advance though some of the most recent research fields accessed by tunneling and force spectroscopy, and, in particular:
– Molecular states and their excitations: Vibrations, electrons, and spins…all inside a molecule.
– Forces at the single molecule scale: conformational tracking the deformation of a molecule.

 

Biography

Nacho Pascual (PhD in Physical Sciences in 1998 from the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid) is since 2012 Ikerbasque Research Professor and Group Leader in CIC nanoGUNE. His group investigates fundamental processes at surfaces at the atomic scale using scanning probe microscopies at low temperatures and ultra-high vacuum, and covers many basic of molecular physics, magnetism and superconductivity. Previously, he was Professor at the Freie Universität in Berlin since 2004, Research Fellow at the Fritz-Haber Institute (Max Planck) and Institut de Ciencia de Materiales (ICMAB-CSIC), and visiting Professor at the Instituto de Nanociencia de Aragon, in Zaragoza.

Institutional Members of the Board of Trustees

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