Structural properties of undercooled liquid sodium and caesium

Abstract

Extensive theoretical results for the temperature dependence of the static and dynamical structure of undercooled alkali metals using Na and Cs as examples are presented. The static structural properties are obtained from the HMSA integral equations using pair potentials derived from an accurate non-local pscudopotential. The dynamical properties obtained from viscoelastic theory are compared with experiments and the results of memory function formalism. The study indicates that collective density excitations are more dominant in the undercooled region than at their melting points, and that the dynamical properties of Na and Cs exhibit subtle differences in their gross features.