Fullerenes have many potential applications in various fields such as biomedicine, organic photovoltaics, molecular device, et al. However, it is still meaningful to explore more functional fullerene materials due to their special structures and attractive properties. In recent years, metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) have gained particular interest due to their potential applications in gas storage, catalysis, sensing, electronics, biomedicine, and so on. Considering the porous character of MOFs, it is fascinating to encapsulate molecular fullerenes into MOF pores and to construct new complex materials with unique properties and applications. In this minireview, we discuss the up-to-date study progress for the fullerene@MOF materials. We introduce firstly the preparation strategies, and then summarize the applications of these fullerene@MOF materials.

Endohedral metallic fullerenes (EMFs), featured by the encapsulation of metal ions, molecules and clusters inside the hollow sphere of carbon cage, have drawn great attention in the fullerene research field because of their unique structures and properties. In this minireview, we reviewed the most recent development in this area, focusing mainly on the large EMFs and magnetic EMFs. The relevance between the large carbon cage and cluster was discussed and the paramagnetism and single-molecule magnetism of EMFs, which are controlled by spin single electron and the coupling of f-shell of metal ions, were summarized.

It’s significant to design luminescent single-molecule magnets and promote their applications in high density data storage and magneto-luminescence devices. In this perspective, we highlight the advances in luminescent single-molecule magnets (SMMs), which have various types including metal complexes, metal-organic frameworks (MOFs), ionic liquids, metallofullerenes, and so on. Among them, metallofullerenes as an emergent luminescent SMMs show great prospects due to the varied metal clusters. Finally, we present perspectives and outlooks on the research directions in the future.

Fullerenes have attracted much attention because of their unique electronic structure and spherical cage shape. Specially, fullerenes have been widely used as guest in supramolecular chemistry due to their spherical structures. Recently, the supramolecular complexes of fullerenes and several types of carbon nanorings have been constructed and investigated. The complex of fullerene in carbon nanoring is like a Saturn, and this unique kind of supramolecular complexes will have potential applications in chemical, material and physical fields. In this review, various complexes of fullerene in carbon nanoring and their special properties are described. We hope to expand the application of these supramolecular complexes in various fields.