Abstract
This report presents the variations of the electrical conductivity and the migration of natural pyrite impurity levels at temperatures range from 298 to 573 K and pressures range from 1 atm. to 20.9 GPa. The electrical conductivity increases with temperature at a fixed pressure, displaying the semiconductor behavior of the sample. In spite of the positive correlations of electrical conductivity and pressure, there exists an acceleration in the rate of conductivity increase after ~13 GPa. No indication of a chemical reaction or structural phase transition of pyrite was detected by Raman spectroscopy. The main trace elements that affect the electrical properties of pyrite are determined by inductively coupled plasma with mass spectrometry (ICPMS). The transport activation energy of natural pyrite is ~0.045 eV at ambient pressure, which corresponds to the activation of the CoFe donor level (~1/2 E D), and decreases with increasing pressure.
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Acknowledgements
We thank the editor of Larissa Dobrzhinetskaya and two anonymous reviewers for their very valuable and enlightened comments and suggestions in the reviewing process, which greatly improve the manuscript. We are also grateful to Springer Nature Author Services (SNAS) for their professional helps in English improvements of the manuscript. This research was financially supported by the Strategic Priority Research Program (B) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (XDB 18010401), Key Research Program of Frontier Science of CAS (QYZDB-SSW-DQC009), “135” Program of the Institute of Geochemistry of CAS, Hundred Talents Program of CAS, NSF of China (41474078, 41304068 and 41174079) and the special fund of the West Light Foundation of CAS.
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Liu, K., Dai, L., Li, H. et al. Migration of impurity level reflected in the electrical conductivity variation for natural pyrite at high temperature and high pressure. Phys Chem Minerals 45, 85–92 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00269-017-0904-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00269-017-0904-3