Nearly Unattenuated Charge Density Wave Transport in a Linear Chain Conductor Fabricated by Spark Discharge

Abstract

Chemical preparation techniques have proved in the past unsuitable for the synthesis of linear chain conductors which are said to exhibit anomalously large electrical conductivities via moving charge density waves (CDWs) which are depinned from the underlying linear ionic lattice and move in a direct current (DC) electric field nearly unattenuated. We present a novel technique which uses only purely physical processes to fabricate linear chain conductors which seem to meet all claims laid by the CDW mechanism of conductivity in its ideal form. A spark engraves in an originally low-conducting nonlinear silver-based material, driven far from equilibrium beyond some critical power input, a discharge pattern, inside the branches of which chains of Ag+-ions run which form a high-conducting current path, along which CDWs may propagate nearly unattenuated. The material obtained exhibits an electrical conductivity which is by four orders of magnitude higher than the conductivity of metallic silver. A simple model is presented to explain this high conductivity and some related phenomena associated with electrical conduction via a moving CDW