A Structural Chemistry for Boron

“Structural links between benzenoid aromatics and graphite as well as saturated hydrocarbons and diamond are seen in High School text books. A similar understanding is only beginning to emerge in the chemistry of boron. Our attempts to relate the structures of polyhedral boranes, the equivalents of hydrocarbons, to the structures of the polymorphs of elemental boron will be presented. Several new ideas emerge during this process. For example, the vacancies and extra occupancies in the unit cell of beta-rhombohedral boron are shown to be a consequence of the electronic requirements rather than defects in the structure. Application of the new electronic requirements  to boranes, metallaboranes, elemental boron, boron-rich solids and stuffed boron-fullerenes will be presented. Several predictions arising out of these discussions have been verified experimentally.”