Large “Pillow” Fullerenes as Graphite without Dangling Bonds

Abstract

The possibility is considered of a special class of fullerenes which are not spheres but disks, similar in shape to healthy red-blood cells (or erythrocytes). Such a fullerene would consist of two large, nearly parallel, hexagonal arrays of benzenoid rings, each array connected by 12 pentagons (and typically some supplementary benzenoid rings). Different families of such fullerenes are presented, sometimes via more than one construction. They can be considered to approximate graphite without dangling bonds, especially if the central parts of the hexagonal arrays consisting only of hexagonal rings flatten to yield intramolecular Van der Waals attractive interactions between the two parallel faces of the erythrocyte-like pillow-shaped fullerene.