Polymerized C₆₀: A room-temperature ferromagnet

What may be the first room-temperature metal-free magnet has been discovered — by a lucky accident. A high-pressure, high-temperature procedure developed as part of a search for superconductivity in polymerized C₆₀ instead produced a magnetically ordered state. The organic material displays classical features of ferromagnetism including attachment to another magnet at room temperature, thanks to a Curie temperature of 500 K.

Magnetic carbon
TATIANA L. MAKAROVA, BERTIL SUNDQVIST, ROLAND HÖHNE, PABLO ESQUINAZI, YAKOV KOPELEVICH, PETER SCHARFF, VALERII A. DAVYDOV, LUDMILA S. KASHEVAROVA & ALEKSANDRA V. RAKHMANINA
Nature 413, 716-718 (18 October 2001)
| First Paragraph | Full Text | PDF (165 K) | Supplementary Information |

Materials science: A magnet made from carbon
FERNANDO PALACIO
Conventional wisdom says that magnetic materials have to contain some metallic atoms. So the discovery of a type of pure carbon that is magnetic at room temperature is bound to invite controversy.
Nature 413, 690-691 (18 October 2001)
| Full Text | PDF (64 K) |

18 October 2001 table of contents