Fullerene Chemistry and Structural Analysis
Summary
Fullerenes are a unique class of carbon allotropes characterised by closed‐cage architectures of sp2-hybridised carbon atoms arranged in pentagonal and hexagonal rings. Since the discovery of C60, researchers have synthesised a wide range of cages from C20 to beyond C100, including classical soccer‐ball fullerenes, giant fullerenes and endohedral variants encapsulating metal atoms. Chemical functionalisation has expanded their utility through exohedral attachment of organic moieties, metal doping and supramolecular assemblies, while their innate electronic, photophysical and redox properties underpin applications in organic photovoltaics, molecular electronics, catalysis and biomedical delivery. Structural analysis combines high-resolution experimental methods—X-ray diffraction, NMR, IR/Raman spectroscopy, mass spectrometry and advanced electron microscopy—with computational modelling at the density functional and semi-empirical levels. The integration of theory and experiment has elucidated cage stability, isomer distributions and bonding patterns, guiding targeted synthesis and tuning of material properties. Global interest in fullerenes arises from their potential in energy storage, environmental remediation and nanomedicine, making continued advances in structural characterisation crucial to their technological impact.
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Fullerene Chemistry and Structural Analysis publication trend
The graph below shows the total number of articles in fullerene chemistry and structural analysis across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).
Technical terms
Fullerene: A hollow, closed-cage molecule composed entirely of carbon atoms arranged in pentagonal and hexagonal rings.
Isomer: A molecule with the same chemical formula but a different arrangement of atoms or bonding connectivity.
Kekulé count: The number of distinct Kekulé resonance structures representing π-electron arrangements in a conjugated carbon framework.
Clar number: The maximum number of disjoint aromatic sextets in a polycyclic conjugated system, indicating regions of enhanced aromaticity.
Trapped ion mobility spectrometry (TIMS): An analytical technique that separates ions by size, shape and charge based on their mobility through a gas under an electric field.
References
- Kekulé Counts, Clar Numbers, and ZZ Polynomials for All Isomers of (5,6)-Fullerenes C52–C70. Molecules (2024).
- Probing the structure of giant fullerenes by high resolution trapped ion mobility spectrometry. Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics (2019).
- Breaking of Icosahedral Symmetry: C60 to C70. PLOS ONE (2014).
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