Synthesis of monodispersed prolate spheroid shaped paramagnetic carbon

We demonstrate a single step, efficient, catalyst-and-solvent-free and scalable process for the synthesis of monodisperse, prolate spheroid shaped carbon (PSC) with 3 μm polar and 1.5 μm equatorial diameters by thermolysis of refined corn oil in a closed SS reactor at 700 °C. The autogenic pressure and in situ mass spectra during the thermolysis of corn oil were measured to gain insight on the reaction products as a function of temperature. We have characterized the morphology, structure, composition and magnetic property of PSC by using SEM, EDX, XRD, pair distribution function (PDF), solid state 13C NMR, Raman spectroscopy and EPR. We propose a putative mechanism for their formation by using all the complementary data.