We're learning B-trees in class and have been asked to implement them in code. The teacher has left choice of programming language to us and I want to try and do it in C#. My problem is that the following structure is illegal in C#, unsafe struct BtreeNode { int key_num; // The number of keys in a node int[] key; // Array of keys bool leaf; // Is it a leaf node or not? BtreeNode*[] c; // Pointers to next nodes } Specifically, one is not allowed to create a pointer to point to the structure itself. Is there some work-around or alternate approach I could use? I'm fairly certain that there MUST be a way to do this within the managed code, but I can't figure it out. EDIT: Eric's answer pointed me in the right direction. Here's what I ended up using, class BtreeNode { public List<BtreeNode> children; // The child nodes public static int MinDeg; // The Minimum Degree of the tree public bool IsLeaf { get; set; } // Is the current node a leaf or not? public List<int> key; // The list of keys ... }