Prototypes of molecular motors based on star-shaped organometallic ruthenium complexes.

This tutorial review presents our strategy to control the rotation in a molecular rotary motor, and the family of star-shaped ruthenium complexes designed to perform such a task. The molecules have a piano-stool structure with a "stator" meant to be grafted on a surface, and a "rotor" bearing redox-active groups, so that addressing the molecule with nano-electrodes would trigger rotation.