Silicon Silicon Silicon is a chemical element with symbol Si and atomic number 14. It is a hard and brittle crystalline solid with a blue-grey metallic lustre; and it is a tetravalent metalloid and semiconductor. It is a member of group 14 in the periodic table: carbon is above it; and germanium, tin, and lead are below it. It is relatively unreactive. Because of its large chemical affinity for oxygen, it was not until 1823 that Jöns Jakob Berzelius was first able to prepare it and characterize it in pure form. Its melting and boiling points of 1414 °C and 3265
Fullerene chemistry one or more bonds are removed chemically exposing an orifice. In this way it is possible to insert into it small molecules such as hydrogen, helium or lithium. The first such open-cage fullerene was reported in 1995. In endohedral hydrogen fullerenes the opening, hydrogen insertion and closing back up has already been demonstrated. In heterofullerenes at least one carbon atom is replaced by another element. Based on spectroscopy, substitutions have been reported with boron (borafullerenes), nitrogen (azafullerenes), oxygen, arsenic, germanium, phosphorus, silicon, iron, copper, nickel, rhodium and iridium. Reports on isolated heterofullerenes are limited to those based on nitrogen and