The concepts of the spontaneous polarization of plasma near the metal surface and of the image force are used to propose a simple method of calculation of the face-dependent work function. The calculated work functions for low index planes of aluminium and sodium are in good agreement with experiment.
A variational calculation of the face-dependent work function with pseudopotential corrections employed has been performed. Critical analysis of the comparison between the calculated work function values and the experimental polycrystalline data is also given. The polycrystalline work function data may be treated as the mean low-index work function values and compared with the ones calculated. The use of the simple variational method and the Ashcroft pseudopotential for the description of metallic ions leads to good agreement between theory and experiment, and also enables to explain the increasing or decreasing tendency of work function values in different series of the simple metals.
A generalization of the stabilized jellium model (Perdew et al 1990, Phys. Rev. B 42 11 627) to random alkali-metal alloys is given and applied to calculations of the surface energy and the work function changes due to the concentration in the presence of surface segregation. The calculated variations in surface energy and work function against the concentration of the constituents are in good agreement with measurements.
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