Appropriate for an advanced high school or introductory college chemistry laboratory, the experiment described here allows students to safely perform organic chemistry techniques in the absence of a fume hood. The methods we employ are modifications of those described by Ajie (3), Scrivens (6) and Marecek (7). Owing to the nonpolar nature of fullerene molecules, light-viscosity mineral oil is a suitable solvent for recovery of small quantities of C₆₀. Nontoxic and relatively unreactive, mineral oil has the added benefit of not vaporizing at room temperature, unlike typical organic solvents. While no material safety data sheet (MSDS) is currently available for fullerene soot and its properties have not been fully investigated, recent studies involving topical application of fullerene extracts to mouse skin have shown no tumor-promoting activity in either acute or subchronic exposure (8). In this activity, students solubilize and extract fullerenes (predominantly C₆₀ and C₇₀) from fullerene soot and chromatographically separate C₆₀ molecules from the resulting mixture. The C₆₀ product may then be characterized spectrophotometrically.