SBIR PHASE I: Electrochemical Purification of Metallofullerenes

95-61553阿尔福德 这个小企业创新研究第一阶段项目将试图证明金属富勒烯可以通过电化学过程有效和经济地纯化。金属富勒烯是含有捕获的金属原子或原子的封闭碳笼分子。它们是一类独特的新型分子，具有各种潜在的工业应用。由于包封的金属原子将其电子转移到富勒烯壳，金属富勒烯具有与空富勒烯基本不同的电子结构。与目前使用非常昂贵和耗时的两步色谱法的纯化方法相比，基于这种大的差异的电化学纯化方法具有从根本上降低纯化金属富勒烯的成本的潜力。 这种色谱法的高昂成本阻碍了纯金属富勒烯的商业化，使得迄今为止金属富勒烯的工业应用研究在经济上不可行。开发一种相对便宜的电化学纯化方法，可以扩大到更大的容量，将有助于促进金属富勒烯在超导体，电子学，非线性光学和制药等领域的工业应用的发展。在第一阶段，将确定电化学纯化金属富勒烯的可行性，并计划在第二阶段进一步优化和扩大该工艺。

95-61553 Alford This Small Business Innovation Research Phase I project will attempt to demonstrate that metallofullerenes can be efficiently and economically purified via electrochemical processes. Metallofullerenes are closed carbon cage molecules containing a trapped metal atom or atoms. They are a unique new class of molecules with a variety of potential industrial applications. Because the encapsulated metal atom transfers its electrons to the fullerene shell, metallofullerenes have a substantially different electronic structure than empty fullerenes. An electrochemical purification process based on this large difference has the potential of radically reducing the cost of purifying metallofullerenes as compared to the current purification method which utilizes a very expensive and time consuming two step chromatography process. The prohibitive cost of this chromatography process has prevented pure metallofullerenes from being commercially available_making research on industrial applications of metallofullerenes economically infeasible to date. Development of a relatively inexpensive electrochemical purification process that could be scaled to much larger capactities would help spur the development of industrial applications for metallofullerenes in such fields as superconductors, electronics, nonlinear optics, and pharmaceuticals. During Phase I, the feasibility of electrochemical purification of metallofullerenes will be determined, with further optimization and scale-up of this process planned for Phase II.