Experimental study of physical parameters significant in fullerene synthesis

Abstract

In this work, the effect of physical parameters on the yield of fullerene synthesized in a hollow cathode plasma reactor is investigated. The experimental investigations done previously have shown that the fullerene yield depended on technical parameters - the current intensity, inert gas pressure, type of gas and interelectrode gap. The aim of this work was to show that the fullerene yield depends on physical parameters - carbon concentration, carbon flow rate from the interelectrode gap, axial temperature and temperature gradient between the are channel and the chamber walls as well. It was found that fullerene synthesis occurs in an inert heat bath with dimensions determined by the temperature gradient. The lower temperature limit is around 2000 K and the value of the upper limit is the value of the axis temperature which depends on the discharge conditions. The synthesis of fullerenes is more effective if the carbon concentration in the heat bath is large and the carbon flow rate from that zone to colder parts of chamber is small.