Metastable quasi-one-dimensional ensembles of nitrogen clusters N-8

Abstract

By means of ab initio and tight-binding calculations it is shown that metastable nitrogen N-8 clusters (boats) can form quasi-one-dimensional ensembles in which the nearest N-8 clusters are bound to each other by covalent bonds. Those ensembles are characterized by rather high energy barriers (similar to0.3 eV) that prevent the fission of the ensembles into isolated N-8 clusters and/or N-2 molecules