Pascal Ruffieux
Achieving long-range ferrimagnetic order in purely organic systems remains a major challenge in molecular magnetism. Here we report the synthesis and characterization of heterospin-coupling motifs, formed by covalently linking spin-1/2 and…
The quest for quantum ground states beyond the conventional Fermi-liquid paradigm remains a central challenge in many-body physics. The ferromagnetic Kondo effect represents a particularly intriguing case: an exotic variant of the Kondo…
Seventeen-carbon-atom-wide armchair graphene nanoribbons (17-AGNRs) are promising candidates for high-performance electronic devices due to their narrow electronic bandgap. Atomic precision in edge structure and width control is achieved…
Open-shell nanographenes have attracted significant attention due to their structurally tunable spin ground state. While most characterization has been conducted on weakly-interacting substrates such as noble metals, the influence of…
On-surface synthesis enables the fabrication of atomically precise graphene nanoribbons (GNRs) with properties defined by their shape and edge topology. While this bottom-up approach provides unmatched control over electronic and structural…
Graphene nanoribbons (GNRs) with atomically precise widths and edge topologies have well-defined band gaps that depend on ribbon dimensions, making them ideal for room-temperature switching applications like field-effect transistors (FETs).…
Conventional methods to measure the dispersion relations of collective spin excitations involve probing bulk samples with particles such as neutrons, photons or electrons, which carry a well-defined momentum. Open-ended finite-size spin…
Inelastic electron tunneling spectroscopy (IETS) is a powerful measurement technique often used in scanning tunneling spectroscopy to probe excited states of various nanostructures, e.g., the magnetic properties of complex spin systems. The…
Phenalenyl (C$_{13}$H$_9$) is an open-shell spin-$1/2$ nanographene. Using scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) inelastic electron tunneling spectroscopy (IETS), covalently-bonded phenalenyl dimers have been shown to feature conductance…
Haldane's seminal work established two fundamentally different types of excitation spectra for antiferromagnetic Heisenberg quantum spin chains: gapped excitations in integer-spin chains and gapless excitations in half-integer-spin chains.…
In the quest for high-spin building blocks to form covalently bonded 1D or 2D materials with controlled magnetic interactions, $\pi$-electron magnetism provides an ideal framework to engineer large ferromagnetic interactions between…
Atomically precise graphene nanoribbons (GNRs) have a wide range of electronic properties that depend sensitively on their chemical structure. Several types of GNRs have been synthesized on metal surfaces through selective surface-catalyzed…
The Kondo effect describes the scattering of conduction electrons by magnetic impurities, manifesting as an electronic resonance at the Fermi energy with a distinctive temperature evolution. In this letter, we present a critical evaluation…
Unlocking the potential of topological order within many-body spin systems has long been a central pursuit in the realm of quantum materials. Despite extensive efforts, the quest for a versatile platform enabling site-selective spin…
Graphene nanoribbons (GNRs) are atomically precise stripes of graphene with tunable electronic properties, making them promising for room-temperature switching applications like field-effect transistors (FETs). However, challenges persist…
Graphene nanoribbons (GNRs) exhibit a broad range of physicochemical properties that critically depend on their width and edge topology. While the chemically stable GNRs with armchair edges (AGNRs) are semiconductors with width-tunable band…
Fusion of three benzene rings in a triangular fashion gives rise to the smallest open-shell graphene fragment, the phenalenyl radical, whose ${\pi}$-extension leads to an entire family of non-Kekul\'e triangular nanographenes with high-spin…
Atomically precise graphene nanoflakes, called nanographenes, have emerged as a promising platform to realize carbon magnetism. Their ground state spin configuration can be anticipated by Ovchinnikov-Lieb rules based on the mismatch of…
The functionality of atomic quantum emitters is intrinsically linked to their host lattice coordination. Structural distortions that spontaneously break the lattice symmetry strongly impact their optical emission properties and spin-photon…
Carbon-based magnetic structures promise significantly longer coherence times than traditional magnetic materials, which is of fundamental importance for spintronic applications. An elegant way of achieving carbon-based magnetic moments is…