A new molecule is beginning to excite those working in the field of high temperature superconductivity – spherical molecules of Carbon called Buckminster Fullerene because of their resemblance to the geodesic domes of architect Buckminster Fuller, buckyballs for short: they have not yet been demonstrated to superconduct at liquid Nitrogen temperatures, but the temperature is moving up – Allied-Signal Inc has found that mixing Thallium with a buckyball compound, the superconducting temperature went up, seeming to confirm the observation that the further apart the buckyballs are in the crystal lattice, the higher the temperature at which the compound superconducts; excitement has also been generated by a report from a team at Rice University in Houston that they have succeeded in encapsulating Potassium atoms in buckyballs.
