Research Interests

The Bettinger research group is involved in organic materials chemistry with a major focus on conjugated carbon systems ranging from small organic building blocks to carbon nanotubes. We are particularly interested in synthesizing and studying boron and boron-nitrogen derivatives of such aromatic systems for designing materials with particular properties. The boron and boron-nitrogen reactive intermediates involved in the chemical manipulations of conjugated carbon systems are studied by low-temperature spectroscopy (matrix isolation) and by computational means. In addition, synthetic techniques, conventional spectroscopy, and modern microscopy techniques are applied in our research.

Subvalent Boron	Boron compounds receive considerable interest due to their unusual properties. These generally result from the tendency of boron to prefer higher coordination numbers than its position in the periodic table of elements calls for. Lower coordination as in borlyenes is very rare and unusual, but highly interesting and possibly also of prepartive interest. Borylenes are the boron analogs of carbenes and nitrenes, both of which have received great attention and are used for the synthesis of cyclopropane derivatives or photoaffinity labeling of biomolecules and materials. The Bettinger research group is involved in: Synthesis, spectroscopic characterization, and investigation of the chemistry of borylenes under the conditions of matrix isolation. Development of borylenes into synthetically useful reagents for the functionalization of unsaturated carbon systems.

Boron-Nitrogen Derivatives of Organic Molecules	The BN unit is isoelectronic to a C₂ unit and can thus replace the latter. Well known examples are solid boron nitride and borazine, B₃N₃H₆, the analogs of graphite and benzene, respectively. But this analogy can be further extended to reactive intermediates: we are currently studying borylnitrenes and cyclic iminoboranes, which are the isoelectronic derivatives of vinylidenes and arynes, respectively. Again, preparative applications of these reactive intermediates are envisioned, in particular with respect to the synthesis of BN derivatives of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons.

Carbon Nanotubes	Research focuses on the chemical properties of bare single-walled carbon nanotubes (CNT) with the reactivity towards subvalent reactive intermediates being of special interest. The Bettinger research group is performing fundamental quantum chemical study in order to elucidate the chemical properties of CNT. We we are also using reactive intermediates for a targeted modification of CNT. A rather well investigated functionalized form of carbon nanotubes is obtained by fluorination. We have previously studied computationally various aspects of these novel fluorocarbon materials, e.g., thermochemical stability, hydrogen-bonding properties, as well as the reactivity. More recently, we have focused on an analysis of the thermal decomposition products of fluorinated single walled carbon nanotubes.


Formation of carbonaceous materials	The formation of hydrocarbon molecules under conditions found in various regions of the interstellar medium, in the atmospheres of planets, or during terrestrial combustion processes is of broad general interest. We study protopye reactions by means of computational chemistry techniques in collaboration with experimental in theoretical groups worldwide.