Heat conduction in bismuth-antimony alloy single crystals between 4.2 and 300 K

Abstract

Thermal conductivity measurements in the temperature range 4.2–300 K on three single crystals of bismuth containing 1.77, 3.2, and 9.33 at % antimony, respectively, are reported. In the low-temperature region, a change from purely phonon-phonon scattering process to a predominantly impurity scattering process was observed with the increase of antimony concentration. In the high-temperature region, the analysis of the results shows the dominance of the electronic contribution over the phonon contribution to the total thermal conductivity, though the latter is not negligible. Individual contributions to total electronic thermal conductivity were calculated, using the equation formulated by Price, for the sample containing 9.33 at % antimony. The agreement between (K _E)_calc and (K _E)_exp = K − K_L seems to be quite satisfactory up to about 200 K.