The Small Neutral Lithium Clusters

Several works about neutral and positively charged lithium clusters can be found in the literature (see, for instance, Refs. 10, 12, 27-29), while there are not so many references for the anionic clusters. The main reason is that, for the anionic lithium clusters, experimental results are unusual and if they exist, they are related to the physical observables indirectly. 

Up to the Li5 cluster, the most stable conformations are planar. Theoretical 

The ground state of the Li2 cluster is well known +. To describe it, we 

It is necessary to use two VB orbitals to build the structure Ei and 4 orbitals for structures E2 and E3. In this latter case, a pair of orbitals is centered on each lithium atom. The VB wave function for the system, in its ground state, is 

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Binding energy per atom EJn (kcal/mol) of the small neutral lithium clusters. 

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