  We study single-electron transport in a three-ion molecule with strong
uniaxial anisotropy and in the presence of a transverse magnetic field. Two
magnetic ions are connected to each other through a third, nonmagnetic ion. The
magnetic ions are coupled to ideal metallic leads and a back gate voltage is
applied to the molecule, forming a field-effect transistor. The microscopic
Hamiltonian describing this system includes inter-ion hopping, on-site
repulsions, and magnetic anisotropies. For a range of values of the parameters
of the Hamiltonian, we obtain an energy spectrum similar to that of
single-molecule magnets in the giant-spin approximation where the two states
with maximum spin projection along the uniaxial anisotropy axis are well
separated from other states. In addition, upon applying an external in-plane
magnetic field, the energy gap between the ground and first excited states of
the molecule oscillates, going to zero at certain special values of the field,
in analogy to the diabolical points resulting from Berry phase interference in
the giant spin model. Thus, our microscopic model provides the same
phenomenological behavior expected from the giant spin model of a
single-molecule magnet but with direct access to the internal structure of the
molecule, thus making it more appropriate for realistic electronic transport
studies. To illustrate this point, the nonlinear electronic transport in the
sequential tunneling regime is evaluated for values of the field near these
degeneracy points. We show that the existence of these points has a clear
signature in the I-V characteristics of the molecule, most notably the
modulation of excitation lines in the differential conductance.
