Abstract
When atoms are chemically bound to one another, one finds that they have well-defined equilibrium separations that are determined by the condition that the total energy is minimized. Therefore, in a solid composed of many identical atoms, the minimum energy can only be obtained when every atom is in an identical environment. This leads to a three-dimensional periodic arrangement that is known as the crystalline state. The same is true for solids that are composed of more than one type of element; in this case, certain “building blocks” comprising a few atoms are the periodically repeated units.
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© 2009 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
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Ibach, H., Lüth, H. (2009). Structure of Solid Matter. In: Solid-State Physics. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-93804-0_2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-93804-0_2
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