Thermal conductivity of copper at various temperatures

Thermal conductivity of copper at various temperatures Junjie Chen Contributor: Junjie Chen, ORCID: 0000-0001-5055-4309, E-mail address: komcjj@gmail.com, Department of Energy and Power Engineering, School of Mechanical and Power Engineering, Henan Polytechnic University, 2000 Century Avenue, Jiaozuo, Henan, 454000, P.R. China Copper is a chemical element with the atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkish-orange color. Copper is used as a conductor of heat and electricity, as a building material, and as a constituent of various metal alloys, such as sterling silver used in jewelry, cupronickel used to make marine hardware and coins, and constantan used in strain gauges and thermocouples for temperature measurement. Copper, silver, and gold are in group 11 of the periodic table; these three metals have one s-orbital electron on top of a filled d-electron shell and are characterized by high ductility, and electrical and thermal conductivity. The filled d-shells in these elements contribute little to interatomic interactions, which are dominated by the s-electrons through metallic bonds. Unlike metals with incomplete d-shells, metallic bonds in copper are lacking a covalent character and are relatively weak. This observation explains the low hardness and high ductility of single crystals of copper. At the macroscopic scale, introduction of extended defects to the crystal lattice, such as grain boundaries, hinders flow of the material under applied stress, thereby increasing its hardness. For this reason, copper is usually supplied in a fine-grained polycrystalline form, which has greater strength than monocrystalline forms. The softness of copper partly explains its high electrical conductivity and high thermal conductivity, second highest among pure metals at room temperature. This is because the resistivity to electron transport in metals at room temperature originates primarily from scattering of electrons on thermal vibrations of the lattice, which are relatively weak in a soft metal. Copper does not react with water, but it does slowly react with atmospheric oxygen to form a layer of brown-black copper oxide which, unlike the rust that forms on iron in moist air, protects the underlying metal from further corrosion. Copper tarnishes when exposed to some sulfur compounds, with which it reacts to form various copper sulfides. Thermodynamic temperature (degrees kelvin), Thermal conductivity (watts per meter-kelvin) 5 13800 10 19600 20 10500 30 4300 40 2050 50 1220 60 850 70 670 80 570 90 514 100 483 200 413 273 401 300 398 400 392 500 388 600 383 700 377 800 371 900 364 1000 357 1100 350 1200 342 1300 334Contributor: Junjie Chen, ORCID: 0000-0001-5055-4309, E-mail address: komcjj@gmail.com, Department of Energy and Power Engineering, School of Mechanical and Power Engineering, Henan Polytechnic University, 2000 Century Avenue, Jiaozuo, Henan, 454000, P.R. Chin