The effect of short range correlations on surface plasmon dispersion

Abstract

Including in a simple approximation the effect of short range correlations between the electrons, the linear coefficient in the dispersion relation of surface plasmons in a classical half-space is calculated as a function of a parameter which represents the radius of the correlation hole. Values of this parameter which are appropriate at metallic densities are determined by requiring that the dispersion relation of bulk plasmons agree with the experimental data. Adopting the criterion leads to the conclusion that short range correlations modify only slightly the dispersion of long-wavelength surface plasmons.