Single molecules and molecular structures are now used as single elements and components in a wide variety of fields, including nanotechnology, electronics, optics, biomedicine, etc. One of the main types of such molecular structures are carbon nanostructures, which include the well-known carbon nanotubes, graphene sheets of various shapes, fullerene molecules, which all have relatively simple geometric shapes. But some new technologies sometimes require something more complex, however, until recently the problem of synthesis of complex molecular carbon nanostructures was associated with many technological difficulties.
A group of Japanese scientists from Nagoya University, Institute of Molecular Sciences, and ICReDD Research Institute made quite a big step in the synthesis of complex carbon nanostructures. Together they managed to develop a method of chemical synthesis and transformations, which resulted in carbon nanostructures in the form of a twisted ribbon, the Mobius ribbon.
Note that the same group of scientists already has an achievement in this field to their credit. In 2017, they succeeded in creating a carbon nanoribbon ring, which can be considered the world’s shortest carbon nanotube. “From our experience creating carbon nanoribbons, we knew that the main obstacle in the upcoming case was the additional strain energy that had to be somehow introduced into the molecule being synthesized,” the researchers wrote, “We ran a series of computer simulations and developed a new synthesis technique that brought us success.”
The process of synthesizing the Mebius carbon nanoribbon is done in 14 steps, each with different chemical reactions and physical processes at work. As before, a carbon nanoribbon is synthesized first, with the ends locked together, but in this case the last step involved a reaction involving nickel atoms, which twisted the ribbon and closed it into a Möbius ribbon. The presence of the topological chirality of the Moebius ribbon structure was confirmed by spectroscopy and a special separation procedure, which allowed us to separate the finished Moebius ribbons from the “failed” results of the conducted processes.
According to the results of preliminary calculations, Mebius carbon nanoribbons should have a number of properties different from those of other carbon nanostructures. Moreover, the scientists do not exclude that the Moebius ribbons synthesized by them will still demonstrate other unpredictable and extraordinary properties that can be used for the benefit of science and technology. And the method developed for the synthesis of Mebius carbon nanoribbons may become the basis for other methods for the synthesis of even more complex carbon nanostructures in the future.
