Richard E. Smalley, the Rice University chemistry professor who shared a Nobel Prize for discovering a new spherical form of carbon and championed the potential of nanotechnology to create a more sustainable economy, died Friday at 62 at the M. D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston.

Dr. Smalley was particularly interested in the possibility that carbon nanotubes could one day be woven into long transmission wires that would be far lighter, stronger and more efficient than today’s electrical grid. He also saw nanotechnology as the key to producing solar and other renewable energy sources that could replace fossil fuels.