S. Saito, A. Oshiyama, "Cohesive mechanism and energy bands of solid C60," Physical Review Letters, 66:2637-40, 1991.

Susumu Saito (NEC Corp., Ibaraki, Japan): "In 1990, I was delighted to hear that an icosahedral geometry of the C60 cluster was confirmed and that these molecules actually crystallized like ordinary atoms. I had already obtained the electronic structure of C60 and C60K (where K is trapped inside the C60 cage) clusters. So, we immediately studied the electronic structure of solid C60.

"We have found that solid C60 can have solid-state energy bands consisting of the electronic states of the C60 cluster, like usual solids having energy bands consisting of atomic electronic states. The electronic structure of solid C60 has been found to be semiconducting, and so we proposed several doping methods for solid C60, including K doping. Independently, K-doped solid C60 has been found to be superconducting and is now one of...

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