Dynamical properties of liquid Al near melting: An orbital-free molecular dynamics study

The static and dynamic structure of liquid Al is studied using the orbital free ab initio molecular dynamics method. Two thermodynamic states along the coexistence line are considered, namely T=943 and 1323 K, for which x-ray and neutron scattering data are available. A kinetic-energy functional which fulfills a number of physically relevant conditions is employed, along with a local first-principles pseudopotential. In addition to a comparison with experiment, we also compare our ab initio results with those obtained from conventional molecular-dynamics simulations using effective interionic pair potentials derived from second-order pseudopotential perturbation theory.