STATIC, STATISTICAL, AND DYNAMICAL PROPERTIES OF SMALL SODIUM CLUSTERS

This paper reports results obtained in the study of small alkali metal clusters (2 less-than-or-equal-to n less-than-or-equal-to 34). Proper ties of interest include static descriptions of the Potential Energy S urfaces (PES) using a Distance-Dependent Tight Binding hamiltonian (DD TB) and new results obtained with the same hamiltonian through a Monte -Carlo Growth Method (MCGM) which is shown to give an efficient way to sample the PES, but may also be helpful to estimate the statistical o ccurrences of the various isomers (catching areas). The probability fo r generating a given configuration is proportional to a Boltzmann dist ribution factor and hence a temperature dependence is introduced in th e study of the PES. In section 2, the temperature dependence of the op tical response for small clusters (on the example of Na4) is simulated through ab initio calculations of the electronic structure coupled wi th Monte-Carlo dynamics on the absorbing system in the ground state.