Chemical Physics Letters, Vol.368, No.3-4, 282-288, 2003
Laser controlled molecular switches and transistors
We investigate the possibility of optical current control through single molecules which are weakly coupled to leads. A master equation approach for the transport through a molecule is combined with a Floquet theory for the time-dependent molecule. This yields an efficient numerical approach to the evaluation of the current through time-dependent nano-structures in the presence of a finite external voltage. We propose tunable optical current switching in two- and three-terminal molecular electronic devices driven by properly adjusted laser fields, i.e., a novel class of molecular transistors. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.