Encapsulation of crystalline boron carbide into graphitic nanoclusters from the arc-discharge soot

Boron carbide crystals were encapsulated into multiwalled graphitic carbon clusters that were prepared from a boron-containing composite anode by utilizing arc-discharge. The encapsulants are compounds of the lightest element that has yet been encapsulated, and the first of the non-metallic. The encapsulated multiwalled clusters are predominantly observed in the soot, a location where rarely graphitic multiwalled structures have ever been found before. The known tendency of boron to catalyze graphitization can possibly explain this observation.