Atomic size oscillations in conductance histograms for gold nanowires and the influence of work hardening

TL;DR

This paper investigates how the atomic-scale structure and microstructure of gold nanowires influence their conductance properties, revealing periodic oscillations linked to atomic discreteness and microstructural effects.

Contribution

It demonstrates the impact of initial microstructure on metastable configurations and identifies new periodic conductance structures related to atomic size effects in gold nanowires.

Findings

Atomic size oscillations observed in conductance histograms.

Microstructure influences the stability of nanowire configurations.

Periodic structures linked to atomic discreteness in contact size.

Abstract

Nanowires of different nature have been shown to self-assemble as a function of stress at the contact between two macroscopic metallic leads. Here we demonstrate for gold wires that the balance between various metastable nanowire configurations is influenced by the microstructure of the starting materials and we discover a new set of periodic structures, which we interpret as due to the atomic discreteness of the contact size for the three principal crystal orientations.