Evidence of hollow golden cages

The fullerenes are the first “free-standing” elemental hollow cages identified by spectroscopy experiments and synthesized in the bulk. Here, we report experimental and theoretical evidence of hollow cages consisting of pure metal atoms, Au–n (n = 16–18); to our knowledge, free-standing metal hollow cages have not been previously detected in the laboratory. These hollow golden cages (“bucky gold”) have an average diameter \u3e5.5 Å, which can easily accommodate one guest atom inside