Abstract
Graphite, when vaporized by laser irradiation, produces a very stable cluster of 60 carbon atoms which, it has been suggested, takes the uniquely elegant form of one of the archimedian semiregular polyhedra—the truncated icosahedron1,2. In considering the possibility of other structures of especial stability, we are led by a sequence of fairly general arguments to consider a relatively restricted family of high-symmetry cage structures, which correspond to novel convex polyhedra of icosahedral symmetry. Considering each of the smaller (computationally accessable) species in the family we predict here that C20 is unstable; C80 and C140 have moderate resonance energies but are open shell; and C60, C180 and C240 are closed shell especially stable forms. The latter two are possible stable carbon cages not yet experimentally characterized.
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Klein, D., Seitz, W. & Schmalz, T. Icosahedral symmetry carbon cage molecules. Nature 323, 703–706 (1986). https://doi.org/10.1038/323703a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/323703a0
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