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Sulfur chains glass formed by fast compression
Kaiyuan Shi1,2, Xiao Dong3, Zhisheng Zhao4
1Key Laboratory of Photochemistry, Institute of Chemistry, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100190, China.
Nature Communications
|January 3, 2025
Summary
Elemental sulfur rapidly compressed forms a unique glassy polymeric chain state (Am-SP), distinct from its usual S8 phase. This fast compression technique offers new avenues for high-pressure synthesis and studying sulfur
Area of Science:
- Materials Science
- Condensed Matter Physics
- Solid State Chemistry
Background:
- Elemental sulfur exhibits exceptional allotrope and polymorph diversity due to its atoms' propensity for forming diverse molecular and polymeric structures.
- Sulfur's phase diagram is complex, transitioning between insulating, semiconducting, and metallic states under varying pressure and temperature conditions.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the structural transformations of liquid sulfur under rapid compression.
- To explore the potential of fast compression as a method for synthesizing novel sulfur phases and studying their properties.
Main Methods:
- Utilized a fast compression technique to rapidly pressurize liquid sulfur.
- Analyzed the resulting structural state of the compressed sulfur.
Main Results:
- Demonstrated that rapid pressurization effectively breaks sulfur's molecular ring structure, yielding a glassy polymeric state composed of pure-chain molecules (Am-SP).
- This disordered chain state (Am-SP) is found to be metastable in a pressure-temperature region typically associated with the S8 molecular ring phase (Phase I).
- The fast compression technique acts similarly to thermal quenching, irrespective of temperature.
Conclusions:
- The creation of elemental sulfur glass (Am-SP) provides a novel platform for investigating structure-property relationships in various sulfur phases.
- Fast compression offers a versatile and rapid method for high-pressure synthesis, enabling control over fundamental thermodynamic parameters and potentially creating new materials.
