Thermal conductivity in alkali and noble metals

The coefficient of thermal conductivity in pure single-crystal monovalent metals is calculated in a quasi-classical kinetic-theory analysis employing the quantum Boltzmann equation, which includes electron-phonon scattering matrix elements. The analysis gives rise to an expression for the coefficient of thermal conductivity, kappa (T), which has the generic form of experimentally observed curves. That is, kappa (T) has a linear temperature dependence in the temperature domain T much less than Theta (D), for which d kappa /dT scales as Z(5/6)n(M/m(5))(1/2) and goes through a maximum at T congruent to Theta (D)/5. In the domain T much greater than Theta (D), kappa (T) is asymptotic to a constant which scales as (Z/M)n(4/3)/m(3). In these expressions, Theta (D) is the Debye temperature, (n, m) are electron number density and mass, respectively, and (M, Z) are ion mass and valence number, respectively. Two appendices are included. In the first, it is shown that the derived expression for kappa (T) agrees with asymptotic values of observed properties of this parameter. In the second, it is shown that the decay of an electron in a metal with emission of an acoustic phonon persists at 0 K. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.