Definition of fullerenes

Compounds composed solely of an even number of carbon atoms, which form a cage-like fused-ring polycyclic system with twelve five-membered rings and the rest six-membered rings. The archetypal example is [60]fullerene, where the atoms and bonds delineate a truncated icosahedron. The term has been broadened to include any closed cage structure consisting entirely of three-coordinate carbon atoms. Buckminsterfullerenes, W. E. Billups and M. A. Ciufolini, Eds., VCH, 1993.


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