New diamond-fullerite composites: preparing and acoustic microscopy study

We report on the synthesis of diamond-fullerite composites under high-pressure/high-temperature treatment. We applied the acoustic microscopy technique to measuring longitudinal and shear sound velocities and determinating elastic constants of the diamond-fullerite composites. Bulk elastic modulus of particular ultrahard fullerite compounds is essentially higher than diamond's one, while the shear modulus and the Young modulus are less. In consequence of these features, the bulk elastic modulus B of diamond-fullerite composites is in inverse proportion to mass fraction of diamond, while the other elastic constants depend only slightly on diamond concentration The acoustic microscopy images reflected microstructure of diamond-fullerite composites speciments were obtained.