  The mechanisms of formation of a metastable defect isomer of fullerene C60
due to the Stone-Wales transformation are theoretically studied. It is
demonstrated that the paths of the "dynamic" Stone-Wales transformation at a
high sufficient for overcoming potential barriers) temperature can differ from
the two "adiabatic" transformation paths discussed in the literature. This
behavior is due to the presence of a great near-flat segment of the
potential-energy surface in the neighborhood of metastable states. Besides, the
sequence of rupture and formation of interatomic bonds is other than that in
the case of the adiabatictransformation.
