ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses component and systems requirements in the light of the problem of manufacture. It shows that there are still problems to be solved in the fabrication of a molecular electronic system, and that the Langmuir–Blodgett (LB) technique is one of the more promising methods for assembling functional molecules. The technique of LB deposition is indisputably important for molecular electronics in this capacity, as it is one of the few ways of fabricating low-defect organic structures patterned on a molecular scale. It is well adapted to the fabrication of molecular rectifiers. Most of the illustrations of the LB technique, and indeed most of the specific knowledge about it, concerns molecules that are clearly incapable of performing any active data transformation function. While at mesoscopic length scales other techniques are available for the manipulation of matter, the LB technique will always represent a method of choice for assembling functional molecules into a layer to make electrical connection to them.
