Thus n atoms of a solid should in principle store twice as much energy as n atoms of a monatomic gas. One way to look at this result is to observe that the monatomic gas can only store energy as kinetic energy of the atoms, whereas the solid can store it also as potential energy of the bonds strained by the vibrations. The atom-molar heat capacity of a polyatomic gas approaches that of a solid as the number n of atoms per molecule increases.