Journal of Physical Chemistry A, Vol.123, No.21, 4599-4608, 2019
Charged Clusters of C-60 and Au or Cu: Evidence for Stable Sizes and Specific Dissociation Channels
We have doped helium nanodroplets with C-60 and either gold or copper. Positively or negatively charged (C-60)(m)M-n(+/-) ions (M = Au or Cu) containing up to approximate to 10 fullerenes and approximate to 20 metal atoms are formed by electron ionization. The abundance distributions extracted from high-resolution mass spectra reveal several local anomalies. The sizes of the four most stable (C-60)(m)Au-n(+/-) ions identified in previous calculations for small values of m and n (m <= 2 and n <= 2, or m = 1 and n = 3) agree with local maxima in the abundance distributions. Our data suggest the existence of several other relatively stable ions including (C-60)(2)Au-3(+/-) and (C-60)(3)Au-4(-). Another feature, namely the absence of bare (C-60)(2)(+/-), confirms the prediction that (C-60)(2)M-+/- dissociates by loss of C-60(+/-) rather than loss of M. The experimental data also reveal the preference for loss of (charged or neutral) C-60 over loss of a metal atom from some larger species such as (C-60)(3)M-3(+). In contrast to these similarities between Au and Cu, the abundance distributions of (C-60)(3)Au-n(-) and (C-60)(3)Cu-n(-) are markedly different. In this discussion, we emphasize the similarities and differences between anions and cations, and between gold and copper. Also noteworthy is the observation of dianions (C-60)(m)Au-n(2-) for m = 2, 4, and 6.