Michael Crommie

About

Michael Crommie received a B.S. degree in physics from UCLA in 1984 and his Ph.D. from UC Berkeley in 1991. He was a postdoctoral researcher at IBM Almaden for two years before becoming an Assistant Professor in the Physics Department at Boston University in 1994. He moved his laboratory to the UC Berkeley Physics Department in June 1999 and joined the Berkeley faculty as an Associate Professor. His main research interests lie in exploring the local electronic, magnetic, and mechanical properties of atomic and molecular structures at surfaces. He is interested in studying how local interactions between atomic-scale structures affect their microscopic behavior and how quantum mechanical effects might influence nanodevice behavior in very small structures. His primary experimental tool is scanned probe microscopy, which he uses to fabricate atomic-scale structures and probe them spectroscopically. His research projects include atomic manipulation using scanning tunneling microscopy, exploring and modifying carbon nanostructures such as buckyballs, nanotubes, and graphene at the single atom/molecule level, investigating spin-based nanostructures and quantum spin effects, creating molecular machines from molecular-mechanical building blocks, and exploring nano-photovoltaics for energy conversion. Crommie has received awards including a National Science Foundation Young Investigator Award, the AAAS Newcomb Cleveland Prize, and a Sloan Foundation Fellowship.

Research topics

• Condensed matter physics
• Physics
• Computer Science
• Quantum mechanics
• Materials science
• Nanotechnology
• Crystallography
• Chemistry
• Chemical engineering
• Optics

Selected publications

• Imaging two-dimensional generalized Wigner crystals

  Nature · 2021 · 375 citations

  DOI

• Strong correlations and orbital texture in single-layer 1T-TaSe2

  Nature Physics · 2020 · 225 citations

  Senior authorCorresponding
  DOI

• Inducing metallicity in graphene nanoribbons via zero-mode superlattices

  Science · 2020 · 209 citations

  Senior authorCorresponding

  The design and fabrication of robust metallic states in graphene nanoribbons (GNRs) are challenging because lateral quantum confinement and many-electron interactions induce electronic band gaps when graphene is patterned at nanometer length scales. Recent developments in bottom-up synthesis have enabled the design and characterization of atomically precise GNRs, but strategies for realizing GNR metallicity have been elusive. Here we demonstrate a general technique for inducing metallicity in GN…

  DOI

• Evidence for quantum spin liquid behaviour in single-layer 1T-TaSe2 from scanning tunnelling microscopy

  Nature Physics · 2021 · 159 citations

  Senior authorCorresponding
  DOI

• Structural and electronic switching of a single crystal 2D metal-organic framework prepared by chemical vapor deposition

  Nature Communications · 2020 · 69 citations

  clusters assemble into a two-dimensional, single-layer framework. Devices are readily fabricated from single vapor-phase grown crystals and exhibit reversible 8-fold changes in conductivity upon illumination at modest powers. Moreover, we identify vapor-induced single crystal transitions that are reversible and responsible for 30-fold changes in conductivity of the metal-organic framework as monitored by in situ device measurements. Gas-phase methods, including chemical vapor deposition, show br…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• NIRT: Synthesis and Control of Molecular Machines

  NSF · $1.4M · 2002–2008

• Interactive Microscopy of Hybrid Scattering Structures

  NSF · $750k · 2018–2022

• Correlating Local Defect Structure with Dynamical Response in Graphene

  NSF · $324k · 2012–2015

Frequent coauthors

• Alex Zettl

  Kavli Energy NanoScience Institute

  534 shared

• Feng Wang

  University of California, Berkeley

  359 shared

• Felix R. Fischer

  Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

  248 shared

• Steven G. Louie

  Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

  229 shared

• Hsin‐Zon Tsai

  Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

  170 shared

• Kenji Watanabe

  National Institute for Materials Science

  162 shared

• Takashi Taniguchi

  161 shared

• Salman Kahn

  Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

  131 shared

Awards & honors

• National Science Foundation Young Investigator Award (1994)
• AAAS Newcomb Cleveland Prize for 1993-94
• Sloan Foundation Fellowship (1997)

Similar researchers at University of California, Berkeley

• Feng Wangh-110
• Robert Harleyh-69
• Scott Mourah-49