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Buckminsterfullerene is a type of fullerene with the formula C60. It has a cage-like fused-ring structure (truncated icosahedron) made of twenty hexagons and twelve pentagons, and resembles a football. Each of its 60 carbon atoms is bonded to its three neighbors. Buckminsterfullerene is a black solid that dissolves in hydrocarbon solvents to produce a violet solution. The compound was discovered in 1985 and has received intense study, although few real world applications have been found. A common, shortened name for buckminsterfullerene is buckyballs. Buckminsterfullerene is the most common naturally occurring fullerene. Small quantities of it can be found in soot. It also exists in space. Neutral C60 has been observed in planetary nebulae and several types of star. The ionised form, C60+, has been identified in the interstellar medium, where it is the cause of several absorption features known as diffuse interstellar bands in the near-infrared. Theoretical predictions of buckminsterfullerene molecules appeared in the late 1960s and early 1970s. It was first generated in 1984 by Eric Rohlfing, Donald Cox, and Andrew Kaldor using a laser to vaporize carbon in a supersonic helium beam, although the group did not realize that buckminsterfullerene had been produced. In 1985 their work was repeated by Harold Kroto, James R. Heath, Sean C. O'Brien, Robert Curl, and Richard Smalley at Rice University, who recognized the structure of C60 as buckminsterfullerene. Concurrent but unconnected to the Kroto-Smalley work, astrophysicists were working with spectroscopists to study infrared emissions from giant red carbon stars. Smalley and team were able to use a laser vaporization technique to create carbon clusters which could potentially emit infrared at the same wavelength as had been emitted by the red carbon star. Hence, the inspiration came to Smalley and team to use the laser technique on graphite to generate fullerenes. Using laser evaporation of graphite the Smalley team found Cn clusters (where n > 20 and even) of which the most common were C60 and C70.

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A fullerene is an allotrope of carbon whose molecule consists of carbon atoms connected by single and double bonds so as to form a closed or partially closed mesh, with fused rings of five to seven atoms. The molecule may be a hollow sphere, ellipsoid, tube, or many other shapes and sizes. Graphene (isolated atomic layers of graphite), which is a flat mesh of regular hexagonal rings, can be seen as an extreme member of the family. Fullerenes with a closed mesh topology are informally denoted by their empirical formula Cn, often written Cn, where n is the number of carbon atoms.

In chemistry, aromaticity means the molecule has cyclic (ring-shaped) structures with pi bonds in resonance (those containing delocalized electrons). Aromatic rings give increased stability compared to saturated compounds having single bonds, and other geometric or connective non-cyclic arrangements with the same set of atoms. Aromatic rings are very stable and do not break apart easily. Organic compounds that are not aromatic are classified as aliphatic compounds—they might be cyclic, but only aromatic rings have enhanced stability.

A nonmetal is a chemical element that, in the broadest sense of the term, has a relatively low density and high electronegativity; they range from colorless gases (like hydrogen) to shiny solids (like carbon, as graphite). They are usually poor conductors of heat and electricity, and brittle or crumbly when solid due to their electrons having low mobility. In contrast, metals are good conductors and most are easily flattened into sheets and drawn into wires since their electrons are generally free-moving.