Structural peculiarities of carbon onions, formed by different methods

Abstract

Carbon onions are concentric multishell fullerene clusters of a few nanometers in size. They can be generated by various techniques. The purpose of the present study is to investigate structural peculiarities of carbon onions, formed under different conditions. The onions in our study were formed by four methods: arc-discharge between two graphite electrodes, high pressure and shear deformation treatment of graphite in the diamond anvil high pressure cell, shock-wave loading of graphite and thermobaric treatment of C60. We examined the onions by using the JEM-2010 highresolution transmission electron microscope, equipped with an EDS detector and the JSM 5800 scanning electron microscope [1, 2]. Following characteristics of carbon onions were examined: shape and amounts of shells, spacing between shells, inner structure and defects.