The gallery of carbon nanostructures


The Buckminsterfullerene C60. On the right: C60 as a truncated icosahedron (green lines).
See also the VRML version

The first type of fullerenes was observed in 1985 by D. Croto and collegues . It consists of exact twelve fivefolds, which can be interpreted as disclinations (the topological defects of rotation).

The capped "armchair" carbon nanotube The icosahedral (I) fullerene C140. It's lattice is lacking the mirror symmetry h

 



The full icosahedral (Ih) fullerene C240. See also: C60



The one-pentagonal carbon nanocone (top and side view). The pentagonal ring is yellow



The carbon nanohorn (side and top view). Five pentagons are marked yellow

The carbon nanotube with a pair of defects (five- and sewenfold; yellow). The "armchair" structure (on the left side) is transforming into the zig-zag structure (on the right)

See also the movie "Flight throught the tube" (gif, 831 Kb.) and the VRML scene.



The spheroidal fullerene C70 (D5h). The plane of the symmetry is shown