J Math Chem
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10910-018-0900-y
ORIGINAL PAPER
PSL (2, 7) and carbon allotrope D168 Schwarzite
Qaiser Mushtaq
1
· Nighat Mumtaz
2
Received: 5 November 2017 / Accepted: 20 March 2018
© Springer International Publishing AG, part of Springer Nature 2018
Abstract We investigate actions of the modular group PSL (2, Z) on the projective
line over finite fields PL (F
7
n ) and find interesting relation between the coset diagram
of orbits and the carbon allotrope with negative curvature D168 Shewarzite. We also
highlighted some topological aspects of these diagrams.
Keywords Projective special linear groups · Heptakisoctahedral group · Coset
diagrams · Genus · Euler’s characteristics
Mathematics Subject Classification Primary 05C38 · 15A15; Secondary 05A15 ·
15A18
1 Introduction
The point groups in chemistry portray the spatial symmetry of molecules [11, 12]. In
this context the groups of the regular polyhedra are specifically noteworthy because
of their point symmetry. It is discussed in [16] that these regular polyhedral groups
are subgroups of larger permutation groups, which themselves are subgroups of the
corresponding symmetric groups S
n
. Of specific pertinence to chemists in [15] is
that these groups may be utilized to depict carbon allotrope structures with negative
curvature built from hexagons and heptagons of sp2-hybridized carbon atoms [7, 15,
B Nighat Mumtaz
nighat_282@hotmail.com
Qaiser Mushtaq
pir_qmushtaq@yahoo.com
1
The Islamia University of Bahawalpur, Bahawalpur, Pakistan
2
Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, Pakistan
123