title: Generation and characterization of low-energy structures in atomic clusters.
abstract: Factors relevant for controlling the structures determined in the local optimization of argon clusters are investigated. In particular, the role of volume and shape for the box where initial structures are generated is assessed. A thorough characterization of the optimization is also presented, based on a nearest-neighbor analysis, in clusters ranging from 30 to 55 atoms. This includes the assessment of the degree of preservation of aspects of the initial randomly generated structure in the final optimized counterpart, and the correlation between optimized energy and the number of nearest neighbors and average departure from the diatomic reference distance. The usefulness of this analysis to explore the energy landscape of atomic clusters is also highlighted.
authors.affiliation: Departamento de Química, Universidade de Coimbra, 3004-535 Coimbra, Portugal. qtmarque@ci.uc.pt
authors.forename: J M C
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Marques
authors.forename: A A C C
authors.initials: AA
authors.lastname: Pais
authors.forename: P E
authors.initials: PE
authors.lastname: Abreu
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D001128:Argon / Q000737:chemistry*; D013816:Thermodynamics
chemical_list: D001128:Argon