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Is there icosahedral ordering in liquid and undercooled metals?
Andrea Di Cicco1, Angela Trapananti, Silena Faggioni
1Istituto Nazionale per la Fisica della Materia (INFM), INFN-LNF and Dipartimento di Fisica, Università degli Studi di Camerino, Via Madonna delle Carceri, I-62032 Camerino, MC, Italy. andrea.dicicco@unicam.it
Physical Review Letters
|October 4, 2003
Summary
New research reveals fivefold local ordering in liquid copper using advanced X-ray absorption. This study determines bond-angle distributions and icosahedral configurations, advancing liquid structure understanding.
Area of Science:
- Condensed matter physics
- Materials science
- Liquid state physics
Background:
- The local structure of simple liquids differs from crystalline systems.
- Previous studies identified fivefold local ordering but lacked detailed geometrical insights.
- Existing knowledge relied on pair distribution, limiting structural determination.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the local geometrical structure of liquid and undercooled liquid copper.
- To determine bond-angle distributions and the fraction of icosahedral configurations.
- To advance the understanding of liquid structures beyond pair correlations.
Main Methods:
- Utilized advanced X-ray absorption spectroscopy experiments on liquid and undercooled liquid copper.
- Employed a novel data-analysis method based on multiple-scattering simulations.
- Focused on extracting information on triplet correlations from experimental data.
Main Results:
- Demonstrated that X-ray absorption data directly contain information on triplet correlations.
- Enabled reliable determination of the bond-angle distribution in liquid copper.
- Quantified the fraction of nearly icosahedral configurations in the liquid state.
Conclusions:
- The study provides direct experimental evidence of local ordering in liquid metals.
- Advanced analysis techniques allow for detailed geometrical structure determination in liquids.
- Findings contribute to a deeper understanding of the fundamental nature of liquid matter.