A Nanographene Disk Rotating a single Molecule Gear on a Cu(111) Surface

TL;DR

This study uses molecular dynamics simulations to explore how lubricants influence the rotational transmission between nanoscale diamond gears on a copper surface, revealing lubricant benefits and the impact of angular velocity.

Contribution

It demonstrates that lubricants facilitate synchronization of nanoscale gear rotation and examines how angular velocity affects gear bonding and motion transfer.

Findings

Lubricants improve rotational synchronization between nanoscale gears.

The angular velocity influences bond formation between gears.

Lubricant effectiveness is independent of molecular species and distance.

Abstract

Lubricants are widely used in macroscopic mechanical systems to reduce friction and wear. However, on the microscopic scale, it is not clear to what extent lubricants are beneficial. Therefore, in this study, we consider two diamond solid-state gears at the nanoscale immersed in different lubricant molecules and perform classical MD simulations to investigate the rotational transmission of motion. We find that lubricants can help to synchronize the rotational transmission between gears regardless of the molecular species and the center-of-mass distance. Moreover, the influence of the angular velocity of the driving gear is investigated and shown to be related to the bond formation process between gears.