World’s smallest diode warms-up for real-life applications

 ‘We managed to build a diode with one single molecule bound to two electrodes,’ explains Ismael Díez-Pérez, a researcher at the University of Barcelona, Spain. Although hearing the word ‘diode’ may only bring LEDs to mind, these electronic components are much more than tiny lights. ‘A diode is an electronic component that allows the flow of current in one direction and blocks it in the opposite,’ says Díez-Pérez. ‘The principle of our device is the same as the one used in a LED, but we are still at the first step: generating the diode behaviour,’ he says.