Scientists Unveil New Form of Carbon - Long-range ordered porous carbons produced from C60

A team of scientists from the Center for Multidimensional Carbon Materials within the Institute for Basic Science (IBS) in South Korea and the University of Science and Technology of China have made a groundbreaking discovery in the field of carbon materials. They have successfully synthesized a new form of carbon, named "long-range ordered porous carbon" (LOPC). The team used C60 fullerene (buckyball) powder mixed with α-Li3N as the base material and subjected it to moderate temperatures and pressure. The process resulted in breaking of some of the carbon-carbon bonds in C60 and the formation of new bonds with neighboring C60 molecules, leading to the discovery of LOPC. Characterization of LOPC revealed that it consists of broken C60 cages that are connected with long-range periodicity and maintain their positions in a standard face-centered cubic crystal lattice.

Figure: Long-range ordered porous carbons [1]

LOPC was found to have a higher degree of electron delocalization than C60 and has an electrical conductivity of 1.17 × 10−2 S cm−1 at room temperature. The discovery of LOPC opens up new avenues for research and has possible applications in the field of carbon materials. The team sees potential for further discoveries by starting with other fullerenes such as C70, C76, C84 and endohedral fullerenes such as M@ C60, where M can be another element like lanthanum. 

According to Director Rodney RUOFF, "This beautiful new type of carbon has many fascinating features and opens up entirely new possibilities in new directions for carbon materials." Although LOPC is not a carbon schwarzite, the experimental challenge for the discovery of carbon schwarzite still remains. This exciting discovery has garnered attention from the scientific community and promises to be a significant contribution to the field of carbon materials. 

Reference

[1]. Pan, F., Ni, K., Xu, T., Chen, H., Wang, Y., Gong, K., ... & Zhu, Y. (2023). Long-range ordered porous carbons produced from C60. Nature, 1-7.