Molecules Spontaneously Form Honycomb

Science Daily is reporting that University of California Researchers have discovered a new process in which molecules assemble into complex patterns without any outside guidance. From the article: "Spreading anthraquinone, a common and inexpensive chemical, on to a flat copper surface, Greg Pawin, a chemistry graduate student working in the laboratory of Ludwig Bartels, associate professor of chemistry, observed the spontaneous formation of a two-dimensional honeycomb network comprised of anthraquinone molecules."

Comments

Really cool, but surprising?

[QuantumFTL]

This is really awesome, however carbon spontaneously forms many different shapes, not the least of which are C60, nanotubes, and graphite (which has a honeycomb shape). As cool as this is, what part of this is "news?"

Re:Really cool, but surprising?

[dwhitman]

carbon spontaneously forms many different shapes, not the least of which are C60, nanotubes, and graphite (which has a honeycomb shape). As cool as this is, what part of this is "news?"

All the examples you give are covalently bonded molecular structures, where the observed regularity is derived from the symmetry of the orbitals forming the bonds.

What's cool about this (as near as I can tell from the junior high-school level article) is that the structures are supramolecular, many orders of magnitude larger than the anthraquinone molecules they are made of. The structures seems to be held together only by (weak) van der Waals interactions between the molecules, influenced by the copper substrate. This is interesting and unusual, if you know enough chemistry to appreciate it.

I'd love to see x-ray diffraction of these layers, to see how the anthraquinones are packing, and how the symmetry of the molecules is reflected in the much larger honeycomb.