Phononic thermal rectifier: a new proposition

Abstract

Abstract We put forward a new proposition for achieving a phonon-based thermal rectifier at the nanoscale level, considering a one-dimensional phononic system. The central mechanism relies on the temperature-dependent spring constant along with the presence of mass modulation which essentially breaks the symmetry in the system and thus leads to different thermal currents in two bias polarities. Along with thermal rectification, the phenomenon of negative differential thermal resistance (NDTR) is also observed. The NDTR effect is utilized further to have the NOT gate operation. The present analysis may open up new possibilities for designing efficient thermal rectifiers and logic gates.