THERMOPOWER OF PURE METALS NEAR THE MELTING-POINT AS A PARAMETER NEEDED TO CONTROL THE SOLIDIFICATION PROCESS

Since the pioneering work of Favier [these d'Etat, University of Grenoble (1977)], it has been shown that, at the solid-liquid interface, the temperature is a function of the velocity at which the solidification front advances. The experiment corresponds to measuring a very small deviation of the temperature from the solidification point of the static liquid-solid interface. Following an idea suggested by Favier, the Seebeck coefficient, S(T), of some pure liquid metals in the solid and liquid phases near the melting temperature, which is necessary to deduce the temperature difference at the junction of the differential thermocouple including the static and moving liquid-solid interfaces, was determined.