VIBRATIONAL AND ELASTIC PROPERTIES OF THE WIGNER ELECTRON LATTICE NEAR MELTING

A density-functional approach is developed to evaluate the phonon frequencies and the elastic constants of the 3D quantal electron lattice near melting from the exchange-correlation local field factor of the electron fluid near crystallization. Results are presented for both the b.c.c. and the f.e.c. structure. Mechanical stability against small deformations is demonstrated for the b.c.c. electron lattice.