Electrical resistivity properties of liquid Pb–Te alloy

Abstract

To study Pb–Te melt structural evolution, its electrical resistivity was experimentally investigated using the DC four-probe method during heating and cooling processes. An abnormal resistivity change was detected in some compositions of the Pb–Te melt, but not in Pb, Te, Pb–Te eutectic and Pb–Te 90 wt% melts. Since resistivity is a structure-sensitive physical quantity and resistivity resort was verified valid for investigating liquid structural changes in past studies, the abnormal resistivity variation can reflect some melt structure characters. So it can be inferred that in some compositions of Pb–Te melts, a temperature-induced liquid structure transition occurred and some compositions did not exhibit the phenomenon. Besides these, some analyses from the perspective of the nearly free electron model are also given in this article.