Electrical properties of Al-In-Sn alloys directionally solidified in high and low gravitational fields

Al-ln-Sn alloys have been directionally solidified in the NASA KC-135 aircraft which flies a series of parabolas to generate high (high-g) and low gravity (low-g) forces parallel to the longitudinal growth axis. Thus, for a given sample successive sections can be identified which were solidified in high-g and in low-g. Measurements on the electronic properties of the samples reveal that (1) the resistivity of the low-g sections is larger (about a factor of 10) than that of the high-g sections; (2) the low-g sections behave conductively like a semi-metal, while the high-g sections are essentially metallic; and (3) both high-g and low-g sections are superconducting but the superconducting transition temperature of the low-g sections is 1 K higher than that of the high-g sections.