Intermediate-temperature specific heat of solids and the rationale behind the Maier-Kelley empirical formula

Fuente: arXiv
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Autores principales: Ribeiro, Valmir, Parisio, Fernando
Formato: Preprint
Publicado: 2025
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author Ribeiro, Valmir
Parisio, Fernando
author_facet Ribeiro, Valmir
Parisio, Fernando
contents The heat capacity of solids at intermediate-to-high temperatures is of fundamental importance to several fields ranging from geology to material science. It depends on a variety of factors, with anharmonicity and, ultimately, melting playing a pivotal role. In this work we develop a first-principles model from an analytically tractable semi-harmonic oscillator Hamiltonian. The resulting specific heat expression depends not only on the Einstein temperature of the material but also on other physical parameters. We compare our predictions with experimental data for copper, aluminum, lead, silicon, and germanium with rather satisfactory results, especially considering that there are no fitting parameters in our theory. We finish this work by showing that our results formally justify the otherwise purely empirical formula by Maier and Kelley, also providing its coefficients in terms of elementary physical quantities.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2508_15009
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Intermediate-temperature specific heat of solids and the rationale behind the Maier-Kelley empirical formula
Ribeiro, Valmir
Parisio, Fernando
Materials Science
Other Condensed Matter
Statistical Mechanics
The heat capacity of solids at intermediate-to-high temperatures is of fundamental importance to several fields ranging from geology to material science. It depends on a variety of factors, with anharmonicity and, ultimately, melting playing a pivotal role. In this work we develop a first-principles model from an analytically tractable semi-harmonic oscillator Hamiltonian. The resulting specific heat expression depends not only on the Einstein temperature of the material but also on other physical parameters. We compare our predictions with experimental data for copper, aluminum, lead, silicon, and germanium with rather satisfactory results, especially considering that there are no fitting parameters in our theory. We finish this work by showing that our results formally justify the otherwise purely empirical formula by Maier and Kelley, also providing its coefficients in terms of elementary physical quantities.
title Intermediate-temperature specific heat of solids and the rationale behind the Maier-Kelley empirical formula
topic Materials Science
Other Condensed Matter
Statistical Mechanics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.15009