Refinement of the Si–O–Si bond angle distribution in vitreous silica

A model of silica glass consisting of a fully connected corner-sharing network of SiO 4 tetrahedra is refined using neutron diffraction data and reverse Monte Carlo modelling. This model is then used to investigate optimal inter-tetrahedral Si–O–Si bond angle distributions. The distribution which is most consistent with the data is found to be centred around θ Si−O−Si = 151.0° with a standard deviation of between 9° and 12°. Other recent determinations of the Si–O–Si bond angle distribution are in good agreement with this result.