Bipolar Conduction is the Origin of the Electronic Transition in Pentatellurides: Metallic vs. Semiconducting Behavior

Abstract

The pentatellurides, ZrTe5 and HfTe5 are layered compounds with one dimensional transition-metal chains that show a never understood temperature dependent transition in transport properties as well as recently discovered properties suggesting topological semimetallic behavior. Here we show that these materials are semiconductors and that the electronic transition is due to a combination of bipolar effects and different anisotropies for electrons and holes. We report magneto-transport properties for two kinds of ZrTe5 single crystals grown with the chemical vapor transport (S1) and the flux method (S2), respectively. These have distinct transport properties at zero field: the S1 displays a metallic behavior with a pronounced resistance peak and a sudden sign reversal in thermopower at approximately 130 K, consistent with previous observations of the electronic transition; in strikingly contrast, the S2 exhibits a semiconducting-like behavior at low temperatures and a positive thermopower over the whole temperature range. Refinements on the single-crystal X-ray diffraction and the energy dispersive spectroscopy analysis revealed the presence of noticeable Te-vacancies in the sample S1, confirming that the widely observed anomalous transport behaviors in pentatellurides actually take place in the Te-deficient samples. Electronic structure calculations show narrow gap semiconducting behavior, with different transport anisotropies for holes and electrons. For the degenerately doped n-type samples, our transport calculations can result in a resistivity peak and crossover in thermopower from negative to positive at temperatures close to that observed experimentally. Our present work resolves the longstanding puzzle regarding the anomalous transport behaviors of pentatellurides, and also resolves the electronic structure in favor of a semiconducting state.

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Cited by in corpus (37)

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• Anomalous thermoelectric effects of ZrTe${}_5$ in and beyond the quantum limit
• Approaching Three-Dimensional Quantum Hall effect in Bulk HfTe5
• Unraveling the Topological Phase of ZrTe${}_5$ via Magneto-infrared Spectroscopy
• Dirac Polarons and Resistivity Anomaly in ZrTe5 and HfTe5
• Electron Transport in Dirac and Weyl Semimetals
• Dirac electron behavior and NMR evidence for topological band inversion in ZrTe5
• Induced anomalous Hall effect of massive Dirac fermions in ZrTe5 and HfTe5 thin flakes
• Thermodynamically Induced Transport Anomaly in Dilute Metals ZrTe${}_5$ and HfTe${}_5$
• Log-periodic quantum magneto-oscillations and discrete scale invariance in topological material HfTe5
• Enhanced thermoelectric performance by van Hove singularities in the density of states of type-II nodal-line semimetals
• Anomalous Hall effect at the Lifshitz transition in ZrTe5
• Distinguishing the gapped and Weyl semimetal scenario in ZrTe${}_5$: insights from an effective two-band model
• Gap-opening transition in Dirac semimetal ZrTe${}_5$
• Multi-carrier transport in ZrTe5 film
• Expansive Open Fermi Arcs and Connectivity Changes Induced by Infrared Phonons in ZrTe5
• Gate-tunable multiband transport in ZrTe5 thin devices
• Probing intraband excitations in ZrTe${}_5$: a high-pressure infrared and transport study
• Nonlinear transport due to magnetic-field-induced flat bands in the nodal-line semimetal ZrTe5
• Unusual magnetoresistance oscillations in preferentially oriented p-type polycrystalline ZrTe5
• Optical conductivity of the type-II Weyl semimetal TaIrTe${}_4$
• Revealing temperature evolution of the Dirac band in ZrTe${}_5$ via magneto-infrared spectroscopy
• Optical conductivity and resistivity in a four-band model for ZrTe${}_5$ from ab-initio calculations
• Revealing the band structure of ZrTe${}_5$ using Multicarrier Transport
• Anomalous Transport Properties of Re${}_3$Ge${}_7$
• Theory of anomalous Hall effect in transition-metal pentatelluride ${\mathrm{ZrTe}}_5$ and ${\mathrm{HfTe}}_5$
• Anomalous magneto-thermoelectric behavior in massive Dirac materials
• On the effects of strain, defects, and interactions on the topological properties of HfTe5
• Turning ZrTe5 into semiconductor through atomic intercalation
• Effect of pressure on the transport properties and thermoelectric performance of Dirac semimetal ZrTe5
• Nernst Plateau in the Quantum Limit of Low-Carrier-Density Topological Insulators
• Robust large-gap topological insulator phase in transition-metal chalcogenide ZrTe${}_4$Se
• Pressure induced electronic band evolution and observation of superconductivity in the Dirac semimetal ZrTe5