Phonon Conductivity of InSb and GaAs in the Temperature Range 2-300 °K

Abstract

The recent modification of Holland's model of two-mode conduction, as proposed by us, has been applied to explain the phonon conductivity of InSb and GaAs. This model, Known as the Sharma-Dubey-Verma model, makes use of Guthrie's classification of three-phonon scattering events. In this model, the exponent $m$ of the temperature, i.e., ${T}^{m(T)}$ is a continuous function of temperature and approaches unity in the high-temperature region for both the longitudinal phonons as well as transverse phonons. The dispersion of acoustic branches is taken into account in replacing $\frac{{v}_{g}}{v_{p}^{2}}$ in the conductivity integrals and this forms the basis of the division of the conductivity integrals for the different polarization branches. The present model gives excellent agreement between the theoretical and experimental values of phonon conductivity except near the maximum where the scattering of phonons by point defects dominates over phonon-phonon scattering as well as boundary scattering of phonons.