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Book of Abstracts Book of Abstracts - Universität Konstanz

Book of Abstracts Book of Abstracts - Universität Konstanz

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Cluster ferroelectricity<br />

Walt de Heer<br />

Georgia Institute <strong>of</strong> Technology<br />

Experiments on beams <strong>of</strong> isolated Nb, Ta, V, Al clusters with up to 200 atoms, show that<br />

these particles attain relatively large electric dipole moments at cryogenic temperatures. This<br />

ferroelectric property cannot be reconciled with normal metallic behavior since the ferroelectric<br />

state implies large internal electric fields. However various aspects <strong>of</strong> this state <strong>of</strong> matter appear<br />

to be closely related to bulk superconductivity. For example, the effect only occurs in metals<br />

that are superconductors in the bulk and a strong dependence even-odd alternation is observed.<br />

The ferroelectric transition temperature is similar to the bulk Tc. A survey <strong>of</strong> the electronic<br />

properties <strong>of</strong> these and other metallic clusters reinforce the superconducting pairing hypotheses<br />

in these clusters.<br />

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