New Representations for the Madelung Constant (Q4947133)

Madelung's constant, essentially the binding energy density of an ideal sodium-chloride crystal, can be defined to be the value at \(1/2\) of the analytic continuation of a three-dimensional Epstein zeta function, namely \(M(s)=\sum'{(-1)^{x+y+z}\over (x^2+y^2+z^2)^s}\). It is an open problem whether the Madelung constant \(M(1/2)\) can be evaluated in terms of other, more basic mathematical constants such as zeta or gamma function values. In this paper the author, after giving a short historical overview, uses a modern theta function identity due to G. Andrews to derive several new, ``almost closed-form'' representations for the Madelung constant and in fact for the function \(M(s)\). The Andrews identity is used to split \(M(s)\) into several parts, some of which can be evaluated explicitly, while others are interesting number-theoretic functions in their own right. This also leads to some new integral representations for \(M(1/2)\).