* It's probably too hot there (2000K in the cold part) for fullerene. The atmosphere there is mostly C2, C3 and CO. (CO is mentioned in the paper as a very good guess, but not mentioned in the press release.)
* If you fill a fullerene with H2 or He, it will float less instead of more.
Indeed, unimaginable what is possible! There will also be traces of H, N, O, S etc due to comets crashing in, so room for carbon chemistry once temperature permits.
I found this similar idea done in a lab: https://cen.acs.org/articles/83/i3/Filling-Fullerene.html
They use H2 instead of He. Is that good enough?
Two side remarks:
* It's probably too hot there (2000K in the cold part) for fullerene. The atmosphere there is mostly C2, C3 and CO. (CO is mentioned in the paper as a very good guess, but not mentioned in the press release.)
* If you fill a fullerene with H2 or He, it will float less instead of more.
I'm no chemist, but I was under the impression that high pressure might allow for the creations of fullerenes even at these kinds of temperatures.
I didn't think they would float (but I can see how "hanging out" could be read that way).
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Indeed, unimaginable what is possible! There will also be traces of H, N, O, S etc due to comets crashing in, so room for carbon chemistry once temperature permits.