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Phonon scattering mechanism in thermoelectric materials revised via resonant x-ray dynamical diffraction

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Abstract

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 CeFe4P12 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.

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Acknowledgments

The authors acknowledge the financial support from Brazilian agencies CAPES (Grant Nos. 88881.119076/2016-01 and 2018-5), FAPESP (Grant Nos. 2018/00303-7, 2019/11564-9, and 2019/15574-9), and CNPq (Grant Nos. 309867/2017-7 and 452287/2019-7), as well as from the NSERC of Canada.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Physics, University of São Paulo, São Paulo, SP, Brazil

    Adriana Valério, Rafaela F. S. Penacchio, Maurício B. Estradiote, Marli R. Cantarino, Fernando A. Garcia & Sérgio L. Morelhão

  2. Department of Physics, University of Guelph, Guelph, Ontario, N1G 1W2, Canada

    Niamh Rafter & Stefan W. Kycia

  3. Brazilian Synchrotron Light Laboratory–LNLS/CNPEM, Campinas, SP, Brazil

    Guilherme A. Calligaris

  4. Instituto de Ciências Exatas e Naturais, Universidade Federal do Pará, Belém, PA, Brazil

    Cláudio M. R. Remédios

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  1. Adriana Valério
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Correspondence to Sérgio L. Morelhão.

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Valério, A., Penacchio, R.F.S., Estradiote, M.B. et al. Phonon scattering mechanism in thermoelectric materials revised via resonant x-ray dynamical diffraction. MRS Communications 10, 265–271 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1557/mrc.2020.37

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