Unavoidable disorder and entropy in multi-component systems

2019/06/03 by Toher, Cormac, Oses, Corey, Hicks, David +1 · 2 citations
#FOS: Physical sciences #Materials Science (cond-mat.mtrl-sci)

paper · doi:10.48550/arxiv.1906.01085

Abstract

The need for improved functionalities is driving the search for more complicated multi-component materials. Despite the factorially increasing composition space, ordered compounds with 4 or more species are rare. Here, we unveil the competition between the gain in enthalpy and entropy with increasing number of species by statistical analysis of the AFLOW data repositories. A threshold in the number of species is found where entropy gain exceeds enthalpy gain. Beyond that, enthalpy can be neglected, and disorder - complete or partial - is unavoidable.

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• AFLOW4: heading toward disorder
• Variable-Temperature Plasmonic High-Entropy Carbides

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