C₆₀

Spheroidal, closed-cage fullerenes are called buckerminsterfullerenes, or “buckyballs,” and cylindrical fullerenes are called nanotubes. A fourth form, called Q-carbon, is crystalline and magnetic. Yet another form, called amorphous carbon, has no crystalline structure. Other forms—such as carbon black, charcoal, lampblack, coal, and

During the period 1985–90 Kroto, working with colleagues at the University of Sussex, Brighton, England, used laboratory microwave spectroscopy techniques to analyze the spectra of carbon chains. These measurements later led to the detection, by radioastronomy, of chainlike molecules consisting of 5 to 11…

They named their discovery buckminsterfullerene (“buckyball”) for its resemblance to the geodesic domes promoted by the American architect R. Buckminster Fuller. Technically called C₆₀ for the 60 carbon atoms that form their hollow spherical structure, buckyballs resemble a football one nanometre in diameter (see figure). In 1991 Sumio Iijima…

The best-known of these is C₆₀, the 60-atom cluster of carbon atoms. In this cluster the atoms occupy the sites of the 60 equivalent vertices of the soccer ball structure, which can be constructed by cutting off the 12 vertices of the icosahedron to make 12 regular 5-sided (regular pentagonal)…