Nanolaboratories: physics and chemistry of small-molecule endofullerenes

• Professor Malcolm Levitt FRS, University of Southampton, UK

Malcolm H Levitt studied at Keble College, Oxford receiving BA Chem (Oxon) in 1978, followed by D Phil with Ray Freeman, Oxford in 1981. He undertook his postdoctoral research with Shimon Vega (Weizmann Institute, Israel) in 1982 and R  R  Ernst (ETH-Zürich) 1982–1985. From 1985–1990 he was staff scientist at the Francis Bitter National Magnet Laboratory, MIT. 1990–1991 - Royal Society Research Fellow at the University of Cambridge, UK. From 1991 –2001 he was Lecturer and later Professor at the University of Stockholm, Sweden. Since 2001 he has been Professor in Physical Chemistry at the School of Chemistry, Southampton University, UK. Principal honors include: LATSIS Research Prize of ETH-Zürich, 1985; Göran Gustafsson Prize in Chemistry, 1996; Ampère Prize of the International Society of Magnetic Resonance, 2005; Honorary Fellow of the Indian Society of Magnetic Resonance, 2006; Adjunct Professorship of the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai, India, 2006; Fellow of the Royal Society, 2007; Laukien Prize in Magnetic Resonance, 2008; Fellow of the International Society of Magnetic Resonance, 2008.

• Professor Tony Horsewill, University of Nottingham, UK

Tony Horsewill is Professor of Physics at the University of Nottingham. His interests in low temperature magnetic resonance began during his PhD studies at the University of Sheffield in the 1970s where he worked under the supervision of Professor Neil Atherton on ENDOR and ESR spectroscopy. He arrived in Nottingham in 1979 where he gained a permanent position in 1983. His research interests lie in the quantum motion of atoms and molecules, with particular emphasis on quantum tunnelling. This has entailed the development of specialised cryogenic NMR techniques, many of which involve magnetic field cycling, to explore interactions and level-crossings between spin Zeeman and molecular tunnelling systems. Rotational tunnelling in symmetrical molecular groups such as CH₃ and translational tunnelling of ¹H in hydrogen bonds have been investigated. In parallel with his NMR work, inelastic neutron scattering experiments have been invaluable in providing a complementary energy window in which to investigate the quantum aspects of molecular dynamics. Notably in recent years this has led to the first neutron scattering studies of small molecule endofullerenes. Tony was elected to a personal Chair in Physics at Nottingham in 2005.

• Professor Nicholas J Turro, Columbia University, USA

• Professor Yasujiro Murata, Kyoto University, Japan

Yasujiro Murata is a Professor at Institute for Chemical Research, Kyoto University.  He was born in Kanazawa and received his BEng (1993) and PhD degrees (1998) from Kyoto University under the supervision of Professor Koichi Komatsu.  During that time he joined Professor Fred Wudl's group as a summer student (1995).  After working as a postdoctoral fellow at Kyoto University in Komatsu group, he joined Institute for Chemical Research, Kyoto University, as an Assistant Professor in Komatsu group (1999).  After the retirement of Professor Komatsu from Kyoto University, he was promoted as an Associate Professor (2006) and then as a Professor (2009-) succeeding to Professor Komatsu's position.  His research interests include the synthesis of fullerene derivatives having novel structures and properties. 

• Professor Malcolm Levitt FRS, University of Southampton, UK
• Audio recording

Malcolm H Levitt studied at Keble College, Oxford receiving BA Chem (Oxon) in 1978, followed by D Phil with Ray Freeman, Oxford in 1981. He undertook his postdoctoral research with Shimon Vega (Weizmann Institute, Israel) in 1982 and R  R  Ernst (ETH-Zürich) 1982–1985. From 1985–1990 he was staff scientist at the Francis Bitter National Magnet Laboratory, MIT. 1990–1991 - Royal Society Research Fellow at the University of Cambridge, UK. From 1991 –2001 he was Lecturer and later Professor at the University of Stockholm, Sweden. Since 2001 he has been Professor in Physical Chemistry at the School of Chemistry, Southampton University, UK. Principal honors include: LATSIS Research Prize of ETH-Zürich, 1985; Göran Gustafsson Prize in Chemistry, 1996; Ampère Prize of the International Society of Magnetic Resonance, 2005; Honorary Fellow of the Indian Society of Magnetic Resonance, 2006; Adjunct Professorship of the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai, India, 2006; Fellow of the Royal Society, 2007; Laukien Prize in Magnetic Resonance, 2008; Fellow of the International Society of Magnetic Resonance, 2008.

• Professor Yasujiro Murata, Kyoto University, Japan
• Audio recording

Yasujiro Murata is a Professor at Institute for Chemical Research, Kyoto University.  He was born in Kanazawa and received his BEng (1993) and PhD degrees (1998) from Kyoto University under the supervision of Professor Koichi Komatsu.  During that time he joined Professor Fred Wudl's group as a summer student (1995).  After working as a postdoctoral fellow at Kyoto University in Komatsu group, he joined Institute for Chemical Research, Kyoto University, as an Assistant Professor in Komatsu group (1999).  After the retirement of Professor Komatsu from Kyoto University, he was promoted as an Associate Professor (2006) and then as a Professor (2009-) succeeding to Professor Komatsu's position.  His research interests include the synthesis of fullerene derivatives having novel structures and properties. 

• Dr Toomas Rõõm, National Institute of Chemical Physics and Biophysics, Estonia
• Audio recording

Dr Toomas Rõõm is a senior research scientist at the National Institute of Chemical Physics and Biophysics, Tallinn, Estonia. He spent his first post-doctoral years exploring enhancement of nuclear magnetic resonance signal with optical pumping in UC Berkeley with Professor E Hahn and A Pines. e He got interested in far-infrared spectroscopy at THz frequencies while doing his second post-doc with Professor T Timusk at McMaster University. Returning to Tallinn ehe established a THz spectroscopy laboratory at NICPB. The customized high magnetic field THz set-up was awarded with Estonian Physics Society annual award in 2010. His research interests are in THz spectroscopy of magnetic systems and correlated electron systems exposed to high magnetic fields. The research interests have expanded into THz and infrared studies of small molecules trapped inside fullerene molecule cages in recent years.

• Professor Alessandro Bagno, University of Padova, Italy
• Audio recording

Professor Bagno graduated in chemistry at the University of Padova in 1981, and in 1985 joined the National Research Council (CNR) as researcher until 2002, where he was appointed Full Professor of Organic Chemistry at the University of Padova.  In 1989 he had a post-doctoral fellowship at the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, USA, with G  A Olah, where he was also a visiting professor in 2009. His research interests are NMR spectroscopy, including heteronuclear magnetic resonance, computational chemistry and physical organic chemistry.

• Professor Tony Horsewill, University of Nottingham, UK
• Audio recording

Tony Horsewill is Professor of Physics at the University of Nottingham. His interests in low temperature magnetic resonance began during his PhD studies at the University of Sheffield in the 1970s where he worked under the supervision of Professor Neil Atherton on ENDOR and ESR spectroscopy. He arrived in Nottingham in 1979 where he gained a permanent position in 1983. His research interests lie in the quantum motion of atoms and molecules, with particular emphasis on quantum tunnelling. This has entailed the development of specialised cryogenic NMR techniques, many of which involve magnetic field cycling, to explore interactions and level-crossings between spin Zeeman and molecular tunnelling systems. Rotational tunnelling in symmetrical molecular groups such as CH₃ and translational tunnelling of ¹H in hydrogen bonds have been investigated. In parallel with his NMR work, inelastic neutron scattering experiments have been invaluable in providing a complementary energy window in which to investigate the quantum aspects of molecular dynamics. Notably in recent years this has led to the first neutron scattering studies of small molecule endofullerenes. Tony was elected to a personal Chair in Physics at Nottingham in 2005.

• Professor Zlatko Bacic, New York University, USA
• Audio recording

Zlatko Bacic is a Professor at the Department of Chemistry, New York University, in New York, USA. He received his BS degree in Chemistry from the University of Zagreb, Croatia, in 1977. In the fall of the same year, he entered the graduate program in Chemistry at the University of Utah, in Salt Lake City, USA, and received his PhD in theoretical chemistry there in 1981.  He spent the next several years at the MPI für Strömungsforschung in Göttingen, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, The University of Chicago, and Los Alamos National Laboratory. In 1988 he joined the faculty of the NYU Chemistry Department, where he has been ever since. The focus of his research has always been on the accurate treatment of molecular systems, floppy molecules and weakly bound clusters, whose properties are dominated by large quantum effects, and which exhibit strongly coupled and anharmonic large-amplitude vibrations. In recent years, his group has initiated rigorous investigations of the quantum dynamics and inelastic neutron spectroscopy of the coupled translation-rotation motions of hydrogen molecules confined inside the nanocavities of fullerenes, clathrate hydrates, and metal-organic frameworks. In recognition of his significant contributions to theoretical chemistry, he was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2011 and a Fellow of the American Physical Society in 2009.

• Professor Ronald G Lawler, Brown University, and Professor Nicholas J Turro, Columbia University, USA
• Audio recording

Ronald G Lawler is Professor of Chemistry Emeritus at Brown University, Providence, RI, USA. His research over the past five decades has involved applications of Electron Paramagnetic Resonance and Nuclear Magnetic Resonance to a variety of problems in chemistry and related areas, including CIDNP, radiation chemistry, radical ion structures and reactions, and comparative physiology studies using in-vivo NMR. Most recently he has been involved in collaborative studies of the properties of the endofullerenes using high resolution NMR. He presently resides in Center Sandwich, NH, USA and “commutes” via the internet to his collaboration with Professor Turro’s group at Columbia University.

• Dr Marina Carravetta, University of Southampton, UK

Dr Carravetta has been working at the University of Southampton (UoS) as a Royal Society University Research Fellow (URF) since October 2007. Her research interests involve methodologies and low temperature solid state NMR, with particular attention to quantum dynamics, superconductivity and materials.

She completed her undergraduate studies in Universita' della Calabria, where she obtained a Chemistry degree with honours. She obtained her PhD in 2003 in the University of Stockholm with Professor Levitt, where she worked with solid-state NMR. She received her PhD certificate in 2003.

She won the Ernst award in 2004 to acknowledge the quality of one of her PhD publications, on solid state NMR on rhodopsin.

She undertook a PDRA position in UoS, where she continued to work with Professor Levitt and played a key role in methodology developments not only for solid state NMR but also for liquid state NMR experiments, on long-lived spin states, a work which opened a new research field in NMR.

As a PDRA, she took the initiative to start a collaboration with Dr Samoson in Tallinn, to perform variable temperature NMR experiments on endohedral complexes of molecular hydrogen with fullerenes. Also this research stream is very successful, and the collaboration network is expanding and flourishing.

In October 2007 she obtained a URF grant. She contributed to the inelastic neutron scattering studies on endofullerene materials and initiated a collaboration on infrared studies with Dr Rõõm in Tallinn.

Very recently, she initiated a new research line involving NMR experiments on superconductors, in powder form, both under static and rotating conditions.

To acknowledge her international recognition, she has 34 publications in internationally refereed journals and has received two awards: the Ernst award in 2004 and the BRSG young researcher award in 2011

• Dr John Morton, University of Oxford, UK
• Audio recording

Dr John Morton has been a Royal Society University Research Fellow at the Department of Materials, Oxford University since 2008, and a Science Research Fellow at St John’s College, Oxford since 2010. He received his PhD from Oxford in 2005 with a thesis on EPR studies of endohedral fullerenes, in particular N@C₆₀. His Quantum Spin Dynamics group studies coherent phenomena of electron and nuclear spins in molecular and semiconductor systems, with a focus on quantum information science. In 2009 he was awarded the Nicolas Kurti European Science Prize and the Cavendish Medal at SET for Britain.

• Dr Salvatore Mamone, University of Southampton, UK
• Audio recording

Salvatore Mamone received his Master’s degree in Physics in 2005 at the University of Pisa (Italy) with a study “On the correlation functions in Ising models with impurities”, under the supervision of Professor Ettore Vicari.   He then joined the solid state NMR group of Professor Malcolm Levitt at the University of Southampton (UK), working on the characterization of endohedral fullerenes by several spectroscopic methods (NMR, infrared, neutron scattering). His PhD on “Theory and spectroscopy of endohedral dihydrogen fullerenes” was obtained in 2011.  He is currently continuing this research through his postdoc in Levitt’s group.

• Professor Dirk Guldi, Friedrich-Alexander University of Erlangen/Nürnberg, Germany

Dirk M Guldi is one of the world-leading scientists in the field of charge transfer/nanocarbons.  In particular, he is well-known for his outstanding contributions to the areas of charge-separation in donor-acceptor materials and construction of nanostructured thin films for solar energy conversion.  His scientific career began at the University of Köln, from where he graduated in Chemistry (1988) and from where he received his PhD (1990).  After a postdoctoral stay at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in Gaithersburg/USA (1991/1992), he took a position at the Hahn-Meitner-Institute Berlin (1992-1994).  Following a brief stay as a Feodor-Lynen Fellow at Syracuse University/USA he joined the faculty of the Notre Dame Radiation Laboratory/USA (1995).  Then, after nearly a decade in the USA, the University of Erlangen-Nürnberg succeeded in attracting Dirk M Guldi back to Germany.

• Professor Koichi Komatsu, Fukui University of Technology and Kyoto University, Japan
• Audio recording

Koichi Komatsu was born in Kyoto and graduated from Kyoto University in 1966.  After obtaining the PhD degree from Kyoto University, he conducted postdoctoral study on polyquinocycloalkanes with Professor Robert West at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, in 1975-76.  Then he returned to Department of Hydrocarbon Chemistry of Kyoto University and served as assistant professor, lecturer, and associate professor.  In 1993, he moved to Institute for Chemical Research of Kyoto University, and worked as a full professor from 1995 until 2006, when, upon retirement, he became Professor Emeritus of Kyoto University and moved to Fukui University of Technology as Professor. 

Komatsu’s research interest is mainly focused on the chemistry of pi-conjugated systems with novel steric and electronic structures and also the chemistry of fullerenes. 

Being a Fellow of Royal Society of Chemistry, Komatsu has received the Divisional Award of the Chemical Society of Japan (organic chemistry) in 1998, Alexander von Humboldt Research Award in 2002, Nozoe Lectureship in 2005, and the Chemical Society of Japan Award for 2005.  His publications include 265 original articles, 35 review articles, and 7 books (co-authoring).

• Panel discussion and closing remarks
• Audio recording