Four triphenyl imidazole fullerene derivatives 3a～3d have been synthesized by 1,3-dipolar cycloaddition. All the compounds were determined and characterized by FT-IR, NMR, MS and elemental analysis. The electrochemical property has been studied by cyclic voltammetry, the result shows that the reduction potentials shift to more negative values compared with C₆₀. The optical limiting properties have been studied using nanosecond and femtosecond timescale. The results show that 3a and 3c indicate significant optical limiting properties, especially in nanosecond timescale, while the phenomenon of 3b can not been observed owing to the introduction of the nitro groups, which reduce the optical activities and are not in favor of optical limiting.

Key words: fulleropyrrolidine, triphenyl imidazole, ultraviolet, fluorescence, optical limiting