En route to chemically and topologically regular (nano)diamond

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We propose the preparation and characterization of nanometer-sized diamond particles accessible through chemical coupling of the naturally occurring diamondoids triamantane, isomeric tetraman-tanes, pentamantane, and hexamantane (which we have already isolated from raw petroleum cuts). In contrast to nanodiamond particle mixtures, which are available from, e.g., detonation of CVD sources; these species have well-defined topological characteristics and represent chemically pure and homogeneous materials. This allows not only their selective preparation and functionalization, but also the study of relationships between their sizes as well as topologies and their exceptional electronic properties as they increase in size from the molecular to the macroscopic do-main. Nanodiamonds thus obtained will be tested towards potential applications (in well established collaboration with project partners in physics) in organic electronics such molecular field emitters, electronic conductive junctions, and thin-layer field transistors.