Experimental verification of the dominant influence of extended carbon networks on the structural, electrical and magnetic properties of a common soot

Common soots are disordered carbonaceous materials containing several per cent of heteroatoms. A question of some importance is to what extent pure carbon networks dominate the properties of common soots. Here, we report the results of a comparative study of fullerene soots which are a form of pure partially ordered carbon and those formed from flaming polystyrene combustion which contain a few per cent of oxygen atoms, using electron diffraction, electron spin resonance (ESR), infra-red transmission and measurements of electrical conductivity. It has been found that despite some important characteristic differences, the annealed fullerene soot and flaming polystyrene soot have a number of important structural, electrical and magnetic features in common, provided that the flame and annealing temperatures are the same. This suggests that the graphitic layer and fullerene related tubular structures found in these materials dominate the electrical properties of these soots regardless of the presence of small quantities of heteroatoms in the soot derived from the flaming combustion of polystyrene.