What Are These Things Good For?

When fullerenes were first discovered, there was much excitement about practical applications. It was speculated that buckyballs would make great lubricants, rolling like little ball bearings between other molecules. Or perhaps drugs could be trapped inside the cages, then released slowly by a triggering mechanism that could break open the cages inside the body.

In fact, no commercial applications of round fullerene cage molecules have appeared yet, despite explorations by such research giants as IBM, Xerox, and DuPont. Some, like the lubricant idea, did not show sufficient economic potential; other lubricants are far cheaper. Highly speculative ideas like buckyball rocket fuel have not been totally rejected (see http://www.islandone.org/APC/Electric/12.html, which rejects the C60 ion engine, but not the rocket fuel).... but are not exactly making headlines, either. And using buckyball materials as superconductors suffers from the same problems as other superconductors-- it's just not clear how to commercialize that quality.

But development is ongoing. It is rare for a new material to leap into the commercial sphere right away, even though that is always the promise right after discovery. A more likely time scale is decades, so don't close the book yet-- even on the rocket fuel.

The most promising areas of investigation involve modification of the C₆₀ (or other) cage. Drug delivery is still a hope, once we learn how to attach the appropriate ligands onto the outside of the cage. Buckyballs have also shown the ability to block the HIV virus from attacking healthy cells under certain conditions. The question is, can it be controlled?

It also turns out that vaporizing C₆₀ leads to a smoother diamond film than vaporizing graphite. Maybe this will help grow tough protective coatings with better properties than what we have now.

And finally, there is still talk of using buckyballs in solar cells or batteries. But personally, I am very skeptical of this possibility. It seems that every wacko new technology is suggested as a way to provide easy, cheap energy or to improve energy storage. Let's not go that way with the buckyball.

But wait. I have left out the most important practical application of buckyballs! The most important and useful thing that comes out of this sort of research is new ideas and paths of investigation. Research breeds more research, which will eventually lead to something genuinely commercializable. It's true. You just have to keep pursuing the leads and asking more and more questions, and eventually you'll hit upon something that the competitors never dreamed of.

And so, I conclude this page on an upbeat note. The original research into pure C₆₀ and the other round fullerenes was a bust in terms of immediate commercial applications, but without this research, we wouldn't have gotten into nanotubes or a whole host of other tangential pursuits. Read on, for the this is the beginning of the story, not the end.

Nanotubes are quite intriguing, and may actually have some practical uses. Or maybe they're just the next step in the process.... only time (and perseverance) will tell.

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Email: kimall (at symbol) mindspring.com