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Free keywords:
Physics, Atomic and Molecular Clusters, physics.atm-clus, Physics, Chemical Physics, physics.chem-ph
Abstract:
We examine the structure of compact metal nanoparticles (NPs) forming
polyhedral sections of the ideal cubic lattice, face centered (fcc), body
centered (bcc), and simple (sc), cubic, which are confined by facets
characterized by densest, second, and third densest {hkl} monolayers of the
lattice. Together with the constraint that the NPs exhibit the same point
symmetry as the ideal cubic lattice, i.e. Oh, different types of generic NPs
serve for the definition of general compact polyhedral cubic NPs. Their
structural properties, such as shape, size, and surface facets, are discussed
in analytical detail with visualization of characteristic examples. This
illustrates the complexity of seemingly simple nanoparticles in a quantitative
account. The geometric relationships of the model particles can also be used to
estimate shapes and sizes of real compact metal nanoparticles observed by
experiment.
