The importance of accurate interaction potentials in the melting of argon nanoclusters

Abstract

The melting temperatures of argon clusters ArN (N = 13, 55, 147, 309, 561, and 923) and of bulk argon have been obtained from exchange Monte Carlo simulations and are compared using different two-body interaction potentials, namely the standard Lennard-Jones (LJ), Aziz and extended Lennard-Jones (ELJ) potentials. The latter potential has many advantages: while maintaining the computational efficiency of the commonly used LJ potential, it is as accurate as the Aziz potential but the computer time scales more favorably with increasing cluster size. By applying the ELJ form and extrapolating the cluster data to the infinite system, we are able to extract the melting point of argon already in good agreement with experimental measurements. By considering the additional Axilrod-Teller three-body contribution as well, we calculate a melting temperature of TELJmelt = 84.7 K compared to the experimental value of Texpmelt = 83.85 K, whereas the LJ potential underestimates the melting point by more than 7 K. Thus melting temperatures within 1 K accuracy are now feasible. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.