The Hall Effect in Liquid Metals

Abstract

A direct current method suitable for the measurement of the Hall coefficient of liquid metals (RL) up to temperatures of about 760 °c is described. It has been applied to cadmium, indium, lead, mercury and zinc and the values of RL so obtained, accurate to about ±6%, are close to those predicted by the free electron theory. Although general agreement is obtained with determinations made by alternating current methods by Busch and Tieche in 1962 and Wilson in 1962 some important differences emerge. The significant departure of RL from the free electron value reported by Busch and Tieche for lead and by Wilson for indium has not been confirmed. For the liquid divalent metals, where the temperature coefficient of resistivity is anomalous, care was taken to establish any temperature dependence of RL. No such dependence would be detected over a temperature range greater than that in other investigations. Some theoretical implications of this work are discussed.