Study of the Free Randomly Moving Electron Transport Peculiarities in Metals

Abstract

In this study, we review some aspects of the application of free randomly moving (RM) electron density and its probability density function distribution to the main free electron transport characteristics of elemental metals. It is shown that metal atom thermal vibrations not only produce free RM electrons, but also produce the same number of electronic defects (weakly shielded ions). The general expressions for the drift mobility, diffusion coefficient, and mean free path of randomly moving electrons are presented. It is shown that the scattering of free RM electrons is mainly due to electronic defects, which cause the distortion of the periodic potential (or the charge density) distribution in the periodic lattice. The resistivity of the elemental metal is caused by electronic defect scattering, taking into account the exchange in the thermal energies between phonons and free RM electrons. Special attention is paid to the analysis of the Hall effect measurement data: the Hall coefficient is presented for two types of RM electrons and holes, taking into account electron-like and hole-like densities of states. The paramagnetism and diamagnetism of the free RM electrons are simply explained using the definition of free RM electron density.