Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • News & Views
  • Published:

Condensed-matter physics

An expanding view of plutonium

Nature volume 410, pages 759–761 (2001)Cite this article

Interactions between electrons make it hard to predict the properties of exotic metals, such as plutonium. Better calculations that include a thorough treatment of electronic structure are the answer.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Relevant articles

Open Access articles citing this article.

Access options

Buy this article

  • Purchase on Springer Link
  • Instant access to full article PDF
Buy now

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Figure 1: Metallic behaviour requires electron orbitals to be overlapping (delocalized) so that the outer electrons can move through the solid by hopping from atom to atom.
Figure 2: How the atomic volumes (volume per atom) of actinide elements, from actinium (Ac) to berkelium (Bk), change with increasing atomic number.

References

  1. Savrasov, S. Y., Kotliar, G. & Abrahams, E. Nature 410, 793–795 (2001).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  2. Friedel, J. in The Physics of Metals (ed. Ziman, J. M.) 361–364 (Cambridge Univ. Press, New York, 1969).

    Google Scholar 

  3. Cooper, N. G. (ed.) Challenges in Plutonium Science (Los Alamos Science, Number 26, 2000).

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Theoretical Division, Condensed Matter Theory Group, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, 87545, New Mexico, USA

    R. C. Albers

Authors
  1. R. C. Albers
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to R. C. Albers.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Albers, R. An expanding view of plutonium. Nature 410, 759–761 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1038/35071205

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/35071205

This article is cited by

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing