Related papers: Dynamic crystallography reveals spontaneous anisot…
Discrete models of dislocations in cubic crystal lattices having one or two atoms per unit cell are proposed. These models have the standard linear anisotropic elasticity as their continuum limit and their main ingredients are the elastic…
The intrinsic nature of glass states and glass transitions at the atomic scale remain a fundamental open question in condensed-matter physics and materials science. By combining femtosecond electron diffraction with time-dependent…
The recent surge of interest in phase change materials GeTe, Ge$_2$Sb$_2$Te$_5$, and related compounds motivated us to revisit the structural phase transition in GeTe in more details than was done before. Rhombohedral-to-cubic ferroelectric…
In this study, we calculate the $T$=300 K scattering and thermoelectric transport properties of rhombohedral GeTe using first-principles modeling. The room-temperature phase of GeTe has a layered structure, with cross-plane and in-plane…
High-performing thermoelectric materials such as Zn$_4$Sb$_3$ and clathrates have atomic disorder as the root to their favorable properties. This makes it extremely difficult to understand and model their properties at a quantitative level,…
CuTe is a two-dimensional (2D) layered material, yet forming a quasi-one-dimensional (quasi-1D) charge-density-wave (CDW) along the a-axis in the ab-plane at high transition temperature $T_{CDW}=335$ K. However, the anisotropic properties…
The prototypical phase change material GeTe shows an enigmatic phase transition at Tc ca. 650 K from rhombohedral (R3m) to cubic (Fm-3m) symmetry. While local probes see little change in bonding, in contrast, average structure probes imply…
Natural hyperbolic materials have attracted significant interest in the field of photonics due to their unique optical properties. Based on the initial successful explorations on layered crystalline materials, hyperbolic dispersion was…
The structure of amorphous Cu$_2$GeTe$_3$ is investigated by a combination of anomalous x-ray scattering and extended x-ray absorption fine structure experiments. The experimental data are analyzed with a reverse Monte Carlo modeling…
In isotropic systems below the transition temperature, the massless Goldstone modes imply critical infrared singularities in the statics and dynamics along the entire coexistence curve. We examine the important question whether these…
Identifying and understanding the mechanisms behind strong phonon-phonon scattering in condensed matter systems is critical to maximizing the efficiency of thermoelectric devices. To date, the leading method to address this has been to…
Directional photocurrents in two-dimensional materials arise from broken crystal symmetry, offering pathways to high-speed, bias-free photodetection beyond conventional devices. Tungsten ditelluride (WTe$_2$), a type-II Weyl semimetal,…
We systematically demonstrate the temperature-dependent thermal transport properties in crystalline Ge$_2$Sb$_2$Te$_5$via first-principles density functional theory-informed linearized Boltzmann transport equation. The investigation,…
SnTe, an archetypical topological crystalline insulator, often shows a transition from a highly symmetric cubic phase to a rhombohedral structure at low temperatures. In order to achieve the highly symmetric cubic phase at low temperatures…
Discrete time crystals are periodically driven systems that display spontaneous symmetry breaking of time translation invariance in the form of indefinite subharmonic oscillations. We introduce a thermodynamically consistent model for a…
Nematic superconductors are characterized by an apparent crystal symmetry breaking that results in the anisotropy of the in-plane upper critical magnetic field $H_{c2}$. The symmetry breaking is usually attributed to the strain of the…
The application of amorphous chalcogenide alloys as data-storage media relies on their ability to undergo an extremely fast (10-100 ns) crystallisation once heated at sufficiently high temperature. However, the peculiar features that make…
Materials with low thermal conductivity usually have complex crystal structures. Herein we experimentally find that a simple crystal structure material AgTlI2 (I4/mcm) owns an extremely low thermal conductivity of 0.25 W/mK at room…
Phase change materials can be reversibly switched between amorphous and crystalline states and often show strong contrast in the optical and electrical properties of these two phases. They are now in widespread use for optical data storage,…
The low temperature acoustic and thermal properties of amorphous, glassy materials are remarkably similar. All these properties are described theoretically with reasonable quantitative accuracy by assuming that the amorphous solid contains…