Liquid-like thermal conduction in intercalated layered crystalline solids

B. Li, H. Wang, Y. Kawakita, Q. Zhang, M. Feygenson, H. L. Yu, D. Wu, K. Ohara, T. Kikuchi, K. Shibata, T. Yamada, X. K. Ning, Y. Chen, J. Q. He, D. Vaknin, R. Q. Wu, K. Nakajima, M. G. Kanatzidis

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

143 Scopus citations

Abstract

As a generic property, all substances transfer heat through microscopic collisions of constituent particles 1 . A solid conducts heat through both transverse and longitudinal acoustic phonons, but a liquid employs only longitudinal vibrations 2,3 . As a result, a solid is usually thermally more conductive than a liquid. In canonical viewpoints, such a difference also serves as the dynamic signature distinguishing a solid from a liquid. Here, we report liquid-like thermal conduction observed in the crystalline AgCrSe2. The transverse acoustic phonons are completely suppressed by the ultrafast dynamic disorder while the longitudinal acoustic phonons are strongly scattered but survive, and are thus responsible for the intrinsically ultralow thermal conductivity. This scenario is applicable to a wide variety of layered compounds with heavy intercalants in the van der Waals gaps, manifesting a broad implication on suppressing thermal conduction. These microscopic insights might reshape the fundamental understanding on thermal transport properties of matter and open up a general opportunity to optimize performances of thermoelectrics.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)226-230
Number of pages5
JournalNature Materials
Volume17
Issue number3
DOIs
StatePublished - Mar 1 2018
Externally publishedYes

Funding

We acknowledge the award of beam time from the Spallation Neutron Source, a DOE Office of Science User Facility operated by the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, via proposal IPTS-13971, from SPring-8 via proposal no. 2015B1070, and from J-PARC via proposal no. 2012P0906. H.W. and R.Q.W. were supported by DOE-BES (grant no. DE-FG02-05ER46237) and the computer simulations were supported by the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC). Ames Laboratory is operated for the US Department of Energy by Iowa State University under contract no. DE-AC02-07CH11358. D.W. and J.Q.H. were supported by the Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong Province (grant no. 2015A030308001) and the leading talents programme of Guangdong Province (grant no. 00201517). H.L.Y. and Y.C. acknowledge the research computing facilities offered by ITS, HKU. We thank M. Kofu for the fruitful discussion.

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