The onion-ring structure for Pd-Pt bimetallic clusters

The onion-ring structure is validated in the Pd-Pt bimetallic clusters of total atom numbers 147 and 309 through the Monte Carlo method by using the second-moment approximation of the tight-binding (TB-SMA) potentials, which is conceived in predicting the possible structures of the bimetallic clusters by He et al. [J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2003, 125, 11034] and Hwang et al. [J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2005, 127, 11140]. In the onion-ring structure, Pd atoms and Pt atoms occupy alternate layers of the clusters. The formation of the onion-ring structure can be associated with the fact that the single Pt impurity is favorable to stay in the subsurface layer and the central part of bimetallic clusters.