Model adsorption potentials of rare gases on boron nitride

Calculations are presented for the interaction of rare-gas atoms (Ar, Kr, Xe) on the (0001) surface of boron nitride. The interaction potential is constructed with use of a damped dipole and a quadrupole attractive part and a repulsive part derived from the effective-medium theory. Only one free parameter has been used to fit the constructed potential to experimental data available. We checked our procedure by calculating the second virial coefficient of the adsorbed atoms interacting with the surface of BN and the interaction potential for the same rare gases on graphite (0001). In both cases we find good agreement with experiments. Finally, we comment on the similarities between rare gases interacting with BN and with graphite and on how our model potential can be applied to other systems.