Electronic Structure and Properties of Cubic Boron Nitride

The electronic structure of cubic boron nitride without and with fractional ionicity is calculated by the application of the composite wave variational version of the APW method. The main calculations are performed at the high symmetry points Γ, X, and L, and the rest of the band structure is obtained by the tight‐binding interpolation scheme of Slater and Koster. The density of states, imaginary part of the dielectric constant, and the effect of pressure on them are calculated and compared with available experimental and theoretical data.