Carbon structures prepared from molten aromatic hydrocarbons

Carbon structures were produced by melting aromatic hydrocarbons in mixtures of fine metal and metal-salt powders and were investigated by electron microscopy. Depending on the preparation conditions, the products contained various amounts of amorphous and microcrystalline carbon, diamond, and tubular structures, including carbon nanotubes 50 to 400 nm in diameter, resulting from the rolling of graphitic layers. The separation between graphitic layers in the nanotubes is much larger than the interlayer spacing in crystalline graphite.