Carbon clusters formed from shocked benzene.
basic_science · Level V
Where this comes from
- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 34471110.
- Also identified by DOI 10.1038/s41467-021-25471-0 and PMC identifier 8410786.
- Licence recorded as CC BY.
- The licence permits redistribution, so the abstract is shown in full and the full text is available from the publisher.
Abstract
Benzene (C<sub>6</sub>H<sub>6</sub>), while stable under ambient conditions, can become chemically reactive at high pressures and temperatures, such as under shock loading conditions. Here, we report in situ x-ray diffraction and small angle x-ray scattering measurements of liquid benzene shocked to 55 GPa, capturing the morphology and crystalline structure of the shock-driven reaction products at nanosecond timescales. The shock-driven chemical reactions in benzene observed using coherent XFEL x-rays were a complex mixture of products composed of carbon and hydrocarbon allotropes. In contrast to the conventional description of diamond, methane and hydrogen formation, our present results indicate that benzene's shock-driven reaction products consist of layered sheet-like hydrocarbon structures and nanosized carbon clusters with mixed sp<sup>2</sup>-sp<sup>3</sup> hybridized bonding. Implications of these findings range from guiding shock synthesis of novel compounds to the fundamentals of carbon transport in planetary physics.