Friday, March 20th, 2009

Nobel Chemist Harry Kroto and Buckyballs

The structure of C60, buckminsterfullerene. Image by Benjah-bmm27.

In the 1980s a group of chemists discovered a beautiful soccer ball-shaped carbon molecule, naming it "buckminsterfullerene" after Buckminster Fuller's geodesic domes. The carbon balls, also known as "buckyballs," had been under the noses of scientists for centuries: they are present even in candle soot. Today their basic research discovery has become the basis for next-generation nanomaterials such as "buckypaper." In this hour, we'll talk with one of the chemists who discovered buckyballs, Nobel prize-winner Harry Kroto. We're broadcasting this week from the campus of Florida State University in Tallahassee, as part of the Origins '09 Symposium.