High-pressure melting curve of platinum from ab initio Z method

Pt is widely used as a standard in high-pressure high-temperature experiments. The available experimental and theoretical data on Pt thermal stability is not consistent. We address the issue of high-pressure Pt melting by ab initio molecular dynamics. We demonstrate a remarkable consistency of our computed melting curve with the experimental data by N. R. Mitra, D. L. Decker, and H. B. Vanfleet [Phys. Rev. 161, 613 (1967) (http://dx.doi.org/10.1103/PhysRev.161.613)]. The extrapolation of their data, based on the Simon equation, nearly coincides with our ab initio computed melting curve. We propose the Pt melting curve in the form Pm (kbar) = 443.0 [(T/Tm) super(1.14) - 1].