Slightly broken icosahedral symmetry advances Thomson problem
arXiv:1408.3473
Abstract
To advance Thomson problem we generalize physical principles suggested by Caspar and Klug (CK) to model icosahedral capsids. Proposed simplest distortions of the CK spherical arrangements yield new-type trial structures very close to the lowest energy ones. In the region 600<N<1000, where N is the number of particles in the structure, we found 40 new spherical crystals with the lowest ever seen energies and curvature-induced topological defects being not the well-known elongated scars but flatten pentagons. These crystals have N values prohibited in the CK model and demonstrate a new way to combine the local hexagonal order and spherical geometry.
arXiv comment10 pages, 4 figures
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