Affiliation：The University of Tokyo

Abstract：Thermal transport in crystalline materials can be suppressed due to the inclusion of local elastic heterogeneities or impurities, where long wavelength phonons get scattered, causing a reduction in the mean free path. The impurity-based scattering mechanism is well understood through the Rayleigh scattering mechanism. However, for amorphous materials, where the thermal transport mechanism comprises both propagating (like phonons) modes called propagons and non-propagating modes called diffusons, it is more challenging to characterise the effect of impurities on vibrational modes. In this study, NEMD simulations were performed on amorphous silicon (a-Si) to investigate the impact of impurities on thermal transport.