Abstract
Whilst it has long been known that disorder profoundly affects transport properties, recent measurements on a series of solid solution 3d-transition metal alloys reveal two orders of magnitude variations in the residual resistivity. Using ab initio methods, we demonstrate that, while the carrier density of all alloys is as high as in normal metals, the electron mean-free-path can vary from ~10 Å (strong scattering limit) to ~103 Å (weak scattering limit). Here, we delineate the underlying electron scattering mechanisms responsible for this disparate behavior. While site-diagonal, spin dependent, potential scattering is always dominant, for alloys containing only Fe, Co, and Ni the majority-spin channel experiences negligible disorder scattering, thereby providing a short circuit, while for Cr/Mn containing alloys both spin channels experience strong disorder scattering due to an electron filling effect. Somewhat surprisingly, other scattering mechanisms—including displacement, or size effect, scattering which has been shown to strongly correlate with such diverse properties as yield strength—are found to be relatively weak in most cases.
Original language | English |
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Article number | 1 |
Journal | npj Computational Materials |
Volume | 5 |
Issue number | 1 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Dec 1 2019 |
Funding
This work was supported by the Energy Dissipation and Defect Evolution (EDDE), an Energy Frontier Research Center funded by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), Office of Science, Basic Energy Sciences under contract number DE-AC05-00OR22725. This research used resources of Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Computer and Data Environment for Science (CADES) and the Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility, which is a DOE Office of Science User Facility supported under Contract DE-AC05-00OR22725. S.M. acknowledges fruitful discussions with K.D. Belashchenko, B.C. Sales, and K. Jin. S.W., S.M., and H.E. would like to thank the DFG (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft) for financial support within the priority program SPP 1538 and the collaborative research centers 689 and 1277.
Funders | Funder number |
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DOE Office of Science | |
Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Computer and Data Environment for Science | |
U.S. Department of Energy | |
Office of Science | |
Basic Energy Sciences | DE-AC05-00OR22725 |
Cades Foundation | |
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft | 1277 |