CORRELATIONS BETWEEN ENTROPY AND VOLUME OF MELTING IN HALIDE SALTS

Melting parameters and transport coefficients in the melt are collated for halides of monovalent, divalent and trivalent metals. A number of systems show a deficit of entropy of melting relative to the linear relations between entropy change and relative volume change on melting that are found to be approximately obeyed by most halides. These behaviours are discussed on the basis of structural and transport data. The deviating systems are classified into three main classes, namely (i) fast-ion conductors in the high-temperature crystal phase such as AgI, (ii) strongly structured network-like systems such as ZnCl2, and (iii) molecular systems melting into associated molecular liquids such as SbCl3