MAEAM for phonon dispersion of noble metals in symmetry and off-symmetry directions

The modified analytical embedded atom method (MAEAM) is applied to calculate the phonon dispersion of three noble metals Cu, Ag and Au in four symmetry and four off-symmetry directions. The calculated dispersion curves are in good agreement with the available experimental results, which implies that the predicted phonon dispersion curves along off-symmetry directions are well behaved. It has been further proved that the MAEAM gives a good description of many-body interatomic interactions in noble metals Cu, Ag and Au. For three noble metals, the phonon frequency decreases for Cu, Ag and Au successively due to the ratio of cohesion energy to atom mass decreases.