The authors present a method for the calculation of the scattering of light by a periodic two-dimensional array of spherical particles adsorbed on a uniform dielectric slab. Multiple scattering of light between the particles of the overlayer and between the overlayer and the substrate is taken fully into account. The method is applied to light scattering from a square lattice of gold particles on a sapphire substrate for which experimental data are available. The agreement between theory and experiment is reasonably good.

The authors present numerical calculations of the absorbance of light by a plane of metallic spheres. The absorbance is calculated as a function of frequency for s- and p-polarized light, for different angles of incidence and for different coverages. They demonstrate the importance of l-pole terms beyond the dipole (l=1) term in interparticle scattering. They examine the effect of disorder and consider the influence of a dielectric substrate on the absorbance of the system consisting of a substrate plus adsorbed spheres.

The authors present local-spin-density-functional calculations for the interaction energies of vacancies with 3d and 4sp impurities in Cu as well as with 4d and 5sp impurities in Ag. The calculations are based on the jellium model and first-order perturbation theory, thus enabling an interpretation of the interaction in purely electrostatic terms. The results are in agreement with those obtained by first-principles calculations and confirm the experimentally known trends.

The authors develop a new efficient method for calculating the shape-truncation functions of arbitrary Voronoi polyhedra by combining analytical and numerical techniques. Applications are presented for cells of cubic symmetry as well as for hexagonal close-packed (HCP) atomic polyhedra with different values of the c/a ratio. They also discuss an efficient way for performing three-dimensional integrations in electronic-structure calculations (e.g. solve Poisson's equation) using shape functions.

We apply the Korringa-Kohn-Rostoker Green’s-function method and perform ab initio calculations based on local-density-functional theory for the vacancy-solute interaction energies in Cu, Ni, Ag, and Pd. In particular, we calculate the nearest-neighbor interaction of vacancies with 3d and 4sp impurities in Cu and Ni as well as with 4d and 5sp impurities in Ag and Pd. We also calculate the divacancy binding energies in these hosts. Further we demonstrate that the Hellmann-Feynman theorem with respect to the nuclear charge provides a useful tool to calculate and understand interaction energies. We discuss applications to jellium calculations for Cu and to the stability of larger agglomerates.

The authors investigate the formation of local spin moments of transition metal impurities diluted in free-electron-like monovalent hosts by performing self-consistent, local spin density functional calculations for all the 3d elements embedded in jellium. The magnetic behaviour of the impurity is studied systematically by varying continuously the jellium density from zero up to a critical value, at which the magnetic moment disappears. The results are in good agreement with the results of other calculations and the available experimental data.