Jump to contact of hcp nanowires

Exploiting molecular dynamics simulations, we have investigated jump to contact (JC) at the recontact of broken Mg and Cd nanowires. We observed frequent JCs for junctions of these soft hcp metals, as previously reported for soft fcc metals [C. Untiedt et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 98, 206801 (2007)]. Thus, the crystal structure matters little for JC, and the high rate of JC should be a common characteristic of soft metal junctions. Recontacts of broken nanowires also lead to the frequent formation of single-atom contacts (SACs). For comparison, we have also studied JC and the SAC formation for tip-sample junctions of Pb. (C) 2016 The Japan Society of Applied Physics