Transport and Thermoelectric Coefficients of the Co 9 S 8 Metal: A Comparison with the Spin Polarized CoS 2

International audienceA Co9S8 dense ceramic sintered by spark plasma sintering has been characterized by X-ray powder diffraction and transmission electron microscopy (diffraction and high resolution). This allowed magnetic, electronic, and thermal transport measurements to be made for a cubic (a = 9.927(2)Å) Co9S8 sample free of impurities and structural defects. The magnetic susceptibility and magnetic field dependence of the magnetization point toward an antiferromagnetic state, whereas the four-probe resistivity reveals a very metallic behavior with ρ300 K = 80 μΩ.cm described by a classical electron phonon model. When compared to CoS2, even if Co9S8 exhibits lower ρ values associated with the lack of ferromagnetic fluctuations existing in the former, the Co9S8 thermoelectric power factor, negative as in CoS2, is smaller, nonetheless leading to a power factor (PF) reaching PF ≈ 0.5 mW m–1 K–2 at 300 K. In Co9S8, with its low ρ going with a very high electronic part of the thermal conductivity κ, the lattice part of κ is smaller than that of CoS2 (∼2 W m–1 K–1 for Co9S8 at 300 K) suggesting that the more complex structure of Co9S8, with two different types of CoSn polyhedra, plays an important role