Intermetallic chalcogenides

Two different types of reactors are used depending on the product synthesized. The first type can maintain pressures up to 150 atm, and is widely used for production of powders in gasless and gas-solid systems. Carbides, borides, silicides, intermetallics, chalcogenides, phosphides, and nitrides are usually produced in this type of reactor. The second type, a high-pressure reactor (up to 2000 atm), is used for the production of nitride-based articles and materials, since higher initial sample densities require elevated reactant gas pressures for full conversion. For example, well-sintered pure BN ceramic with a porosity of about 20-35% was synthesized at 100 to 5000-atm nitrogen pressure (Merzhanov, 1992). Additional examples are discussed in Section III. 

Abstract This review highlights how molecular Zintl compounds can be used to create new materials with a variety of novel opto-electronic and gas absorption properties. The generality of the synthetic approach described in this chapter on coupling various group-IV Zintl clusters provides an important tool for the design of new kinds of periodically ordered mesoporous semiconductors with tunable chemical and physical properties. We illustrate the potential of Zintl compounds to produce highly porous non-oxidic semiconductors, and we also cover the recent advances in the development of mesoporous elemental-based, metal-chalcogenide, and binary intermetallic alloy materials. The principles behind this approach and some perspectives for application of the derived materials are discussed. 

Recently, we and others demonstrated that appropriate germanide Zintl clusters in non-aqueous liquid-crystalline phases of cationic surfactants can assemble well-ordered mesostructured and mesoporous germanium-based semiconductors. These include mesostructured cubic gyroidal and hexagonal mesoporous Ge as well as ordered mesoporous binary intermetallic alloys and Ge-rich chalcogenide semiconductors. 

Because intermetallic systems undoubtedly display certain special features that follow from their metallic binding forces, considerable importance attached to the growing evidence that the chalcogenides, the essentially ionic oxides, the nitrides, and other representative binary compounds of the transition metals were, not infrequently, both variable and irrational in composition. Schenck and Ding-mann s equilibrium study of the iron-oxygen system (39) was notable in this connection They showed that stoichiometric ferrous oxide, FeOi 000, the oxide of an important and typical valence state, did not exist. It lay outside the broad existence field of a nonstoichiometric phase. It is, perhaps, still not certain... 

The rare earths are the key elements in producing useful materials among which are alloys, intermetallics and large numbers of nonmetallic compounds such as oxides, chalcogenides and halides. These materials have been widely used as func-... 

In Table 5, the calculated and available experimental data are collected for the isostructural pressure transitions in Yb chalcogenides. The general trends are reproduced by the calculations. Only for the case of YbO, the calculated transition pressure seems to be significantly too high. In the intermetallic YbAls compound, pressure induces a continuous increase of valence (Kumar et al., 2008), which is in good agreement with the calculated rate of depletion of the 14th f-band in the SIC-LSD calculations. 

In die sections that follow, we briefly discuss the synthesis of inorganic solids by various methods with several examples, paying attention to the chemical routes. While oxide materials occupy a great part of the monograph, other classes of materials such as chalcogenides, carbides, fluorides and nitrides are also discussed. Superconducting oxides, intermetallics, porous materials and intergrowlh structures have been discussed in separate sections. We have added a new section on nanomaterials. 

The experimental papers cover the various spectroscopic techniques and a few deal with special materials. The introductory chapter (62) by Baer and Schneider presents an overview of this field and helps tie the various aspects together that are reviewed in detail in the remaining chapters of the volume. Photoemission studies (UPS - ultraviolet photoemission spectroscopy, and XPS - X-ray photoemission spectroscopy) on various materials are discussed by Campagna and Hillebrecht (chapter 63)- intermetallic compounds, by Lynch and Weaver (chapter 66)— cerium and its compounds, and by Hiifner (chapter 67) - chalcogenides. Other experimental techniques covered include BIS (bremsstrahlung isochromat spectroscopy) by Hillebrecht and Campagna (chapter 70), X-ray absorption and X-ray emission by Rohler (chapter 71) and inelastic electron scattering by Netzer and Matthew (chapter 72). 

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