Appearance of bulk properties in small tungsten oxide clusters

Contrary to the conventional understanding that atomic clusters usually differ in properties and structure from the bulk constituents of which they are comprised, we show that even a dimer of tungsten oxide (WO(3))(2) possesses bulklike features and the geometry of a small cluster containing only 4 tungsten and 12 oxygen atoms bears the hallmarks of crystalline tungsten oxide, WO(3). This observation, based on a synergistic approach involving mass distributions under quasisteady state conditions, photoelectron spectroscopy, and first principles molecular orbital theory, not only illustrates the existence of a class of strongly covalent or ionic materials whose embryonic forms are tiny clusters but also lends the possibility that a fundamental understanding of complex processes such as catalytic reactions on surfaces may be achieved on an atomic scale with clusters as model systems.