Single-molecule junctions are found to show anomalous spikes in dI/dV spectra. The position in energy of the spikes are related to local vibration mode energies. A model of vibrationally induced two-level systems reproduces the data very well. This mechanism is expected to be quite general for single-molecule junctions. It acts as an intrinsic amplification mechanism for local vibration mode features and may be exploited as a new spectroscopic tool.
@article{arxiv.cond-mat/0607447,
title = {Vibrationally Induced Two-Level Systems in Single-Molecule Junctions},
author = {W. H. A. Thijssen and D. Djukic and A. F. Otte and R. H. Bremmer and J. M. van Ruitenbeek},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:cond-mat/0607447},
year = {2009}
}