This award from the Chemistry Research Instrumentation and Facilities (CRIF) Program will assist the Department of Chemistry at The University of California in Davis to acquire an X-ray diffractometer with CCD detector. This equipment will enhance research in a number of areas including the following: (1) studies of the geometry and reactive sites in fullerene chemistry; (2) identification of species produced during metalloporphyrin oxidative degradation; (3) structural parameters of luminescent heavy-metal complexes; (4) new superconducting materials with interesting magnetic and optical properties; (5) chemistry of model biological compounds and their metal complexes; and (6) recovery and synthesis of new natural products with biological activity. The X-ray diffractometer is used to make accurate and precise measurements of the full three dimensional structure of a molecule. The information obtained gives the precise values of all the bond distances and bond angles of a given molecule and it gives accurate information about the spatial arrangement of the molecule relative to the neighboring molecules.
