Catenation: The Latin Word “catena” means chain. The tendency to form a straight chain branched chain or ring-like structures of an element is known as catenation.
Carbon is the only element that shows this property extensively. The best example of catenation of carbon is fullerine. Fullerines have 30-70 carbons which are covalently bonded to each other, e.g. C32, C50, C60 etc. Curl, Smalley & Kroto discovered the structure of Fullerine and they had won Nobel Prize in 1996.
C60 is called Buckminster Fullerine: molecular mass of it is 720 & it is sp2 hybridized. Another name of fullerine → Bucky ball.
