In 1985, the first discovery of a fullerene was published in the journal Nature. In Sep 1985, the American chemists Robert F. Curl, Jr. and Richard E. Smalley, colleagues at Rice met with Sir Harold W. Kroto of the University of Sussex, England. In 11 days of research, they discovered the first fullerene, C60, a spherical cluster of carbon atoms. The discovery of this new structure, dubbed buckminsterfullerene or buckyball, opened a new branch of chemistry, and all three men were awarded the 1996 Nobel Prize for Chemistry for their work.