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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Peng, Yihang, Zhang, Yupei, Zhang, Shuai, Luo, Chenxing, Zheng, Donghao, Naveas, Nelson, Wu, Xifan, Deng, Jie
Format: Preprint
Published: 2026
Subjects:
Online Access:https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.23634
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Table of Contents:
  • The electrical conductivity of high-pressure silicates profoundly influences the interior dynamics of rocky planets. Employing the Kubo-Greenwood formalism, we perform ab initio calculations of electronic conductivity in Fe-bearing post-perovskite under super-Earth mantle conditions, up to 4000 K and 500 GPa. Electronic structures are obtained via many-body perturbation theory, incorporating dynamical screening and correlations among localized Fe-3d orbitals. In contrast to (Fe,Mg)O, for which metallization has been reported at comparable conditions, our results indicate that post-perovskite with Earth-like Fe contents is unlikely to metallize in super-Earth mantles via band-gap closure, yielding negligible low-frequency conductivity. Any substantial conductivity would require non-electronic mechanisms, such as thermally activated small-polaron hopping, which fall beyond the scope of band conduction.