Buckyball maracas: exploring the inside and outside properties of endohedral fullerenes

Abstract

Since the experimental observation of the encapsulation of different species inside fullerene (endohedral fullerenes) cages, several research groups have focused their research in the elaboration of new and novel compounds. Exohedral functionalization of the carbon cages has helped in the discovery of new species and has expanded their potential applications in material science and medicine. Our research group has contributed to the discovery, functionalization, and characterization of new and interesting compounds that have been explored in different applications, but mainly in the field of organic photovoltaics. Here, we report the contribution and progress of our research group in the field of buckyball “maracas.” Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.