Point Defects in Hard-Sphere Crystals

Abstract

We report numerical calculations of the concentration of interstitials in hard-sphere crystals. We find that in a three-dimensional fcc hard-sphere crystal at the melting point, the concentration of interstitials is 2.7(4) × 10-8. This is some 3 orders of magnitude lower than the concentration of vacancies. A simple, analytical estimate yields a value that is in fair agreement with the numerical results.