2003/02/28 by Yan Levin, Jeferson J. Arenzon · 1 citation
Chemistry · Materials Science · Physics and Astronomy · #Electron and X-Ray Spectroscopy Techniques #Electrostatics and Colloid Interactions #Scientific Research and Discoveries #cond-mat.soft #cond-mat.stat-mech #cond-mat.str-el
paper · pdf · doi:10.1209/epl/i2003-00546-1
published as Europhys. Lett. 63, 415 (2003)
openalex publication_date 2003/08/01 · arxiv created 2003/08/04 · arxiv updated 2009/11/30 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/04
We study a variant of the generalized Thomson problem in which n particles are confined to a neutral sphere and interacting by a 1/ r γ potential. It is found that for γ ⩽ 1 the electrostatic repulsion expels all the charges to the surface of the sphere. However, for γ > 1 and n > n c (γ) occupation of the bulk becomes energetically favorable. It is curious to note that the Coulomb law lies exactly on the interface between these two regimes.