Nanocar Research Kept Rolling Along

Abstract

Big pickup trucks, such as those in Ford’s F-Series, were the best-selling automobiles in the U.S. in 2005. But that same year, chemists unveiled a considerably smaller vehicle—the world’s first single-molecule car. Designed and driven by the research groups of Rice University’s James M. Tour and Kevin F. Kelly, respectively, the quirky ’05 coupe featured an oligo(phenylene ethynylene) chassis and axle covalently mounted to four fullerene wheels. Because the tiny vehicle’s wheelbase was less than 5 nm, the researchers dubbed it the nanocar (Nano Lett. 2005, DOI: 10.1021/nl051915k). Tour tells C&EN that his original aim was fairly whimsical. He simply wanted to make a molecule that resembled an everyday object the general public would be familiar with. “This captures the mind of the nonchemist,” Tour explains. “This is where we take our chemistry and bring it into their world.” After that first report, scientists found nanocars have a higher purpose ...