Open AccessThe thermal conductivities of metal crystals.—I. Bismuth
Publication year - 1923
Publication title -
proceedings of the royal society of london. series a, containing papers of a mathematical and physical character
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 2053-9150
pISSN - 0950-1207
DOI - 10.1098/rspa.1923.0096
Subject(s) - bismuth , materials science , metal , crystal (programming language) , thermal conductivity , crystal structure , thermal , lattice (music) , condensed matter physics , solid state , single crystal , chemical physics , crystallography , thermodynamics , chemistry , metallurgy , physics , composite material , computer science , acoustics , programming language
Interpretation of the thermal conductivities of metals yields an important test of the validity of any theory of the solid state. In applying the theory it is usually necessary to assume an ordered arrangement of the atoms on a space lattice. Now all the accurate measurements of thermal conductivity of metals have hitherto been made on bars which consist of a random arrangement of aggregations of small crystals possibly held together by inter-crystalline layers of unknown structure and indefinite extent. It seemed important to compare the results so obtained with the more fundamental values yielded from specimens consisting of a single crystal. Experiments have been carried out in the first instance on bismuth for the reasons that (a ) it is comparatively easy to obtain large crystals, and (b ) it is one of the few metals which does not crystallise in the cubic system. It was thought that any discrepancies between the results for the single crystal and those for the aggregate state would probably be more pronounced in such a case than if a cubic crystal were used.