Engineering of thermoelectric materials requires an understanding of thermal conduction by lattice and electronic degrees of freedom. Filled skutterudites denote a large family of materials suitable for thermoelectric applications where reduced lattice thermal conduction attributed to localized low-frequency vibrations (rattling) of filler cations inside large cages of the structure. In this work, a multi-wavelength method of exploiting X-ray dynamical diffraction in single crystals of CeFe$_4$P$_{12}$ is presented and applied to resolve the atomic amplitudes of vibrations. The results suggest that the vibrational dynamics of the whole filler-cage system is the actual active mechanism behind the optimization of thermoelectric properties.

中文翻译：

---

通过共振 X 射线动态衍射修正热电材料中的声子散射机制

热电材料工程需要通过晶格和电子自由度来理解热传导。填充方钴矿表示适用于热电应用的一大类材料，其中由于结构的大笼内填充阳离子的局部低频振动（嘎嘎声）导致晶格热传导降低。在这项工作中，提出了一种在 CeFe$_4$P$_{12}$ 单晶中利用 X 射线动态衍射的多波长方法，并将其应用于解析振动的原子振幅。结果表明，整个填料笼系统的振动动力学是热电性能优化背后的实际主动机制。