Abstract
Liquid tellurium (Te) is metallic, which is caused by the strong interaction between neighbouring chain-molecules. With decreasing temperature from the melting point (∼450°C) to a supercooled state (∼250°C), liquid Te undergoes a transition from a metal to a semiconductor (M–S transition) being accompanied by volume expansion. Our EXAFS data for supercooled liquid Te were carefully analyzed by adopting a `model-independent' method. It is found that the short chains in liquid Te with metallic nature are composed of short(∼2.80 Å) and long(∼2.95 Å) covalent bonds and that the long bonds vanish on the M–S transition. The M–S transition described above also occurs by the addition of an alkali to liquid Te. The relation of the existence of long covalent bond and the metallic behavior is explained in term of charge fluctuations in the chain molecule.
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