ENHANCED COALESCENCE UPON LASER-DESORPTION OF FULLERENE OXIDES

C60Ox, X=1-3 were prepared by exposing C-60 solutions to ozone. After high performance liquid chromatography purification, these materials w ere studied by laser desorption time of flight mass spectroscopy. Thes e mass spectra suggest that fullerene oxides undergo laser desorption induced coalescence more efficiently than pure C-60. A correlation bet ween the fragmentation of the desorbed parent species and the observed coalescence products both in yield and distribution suggests that eff icient gas phase coalescence involves at least one reactive species, s uch as C-58, produced by fragmentation of the desorbed fullerenes or f ullerene derivatives.