Electrical resistivity of Gd and Lu diluted in 5d-series metals

Abstract

In this work, we study the temperature independent resistivity of Gd and Lu impurities diluted in transition metal hosts belonging to the 5d-series within a hybridized two-band system using a T-matrix formulation. We assume that electrical conduction is governed solely by s-electrons, while the screening of the charge difference induced by the impurities is handled by d-electrons. Importantly, we incorporate the impact of volume differences between impurity and host atoms and account for translational symmetry breaking, which leads to a non-local charge potential that can be self-consistently calculated via an extended Friedel’s sum rule. Additionally, and under some circumstances, our model allows for a clear separation between impurity-induced scattering effects arising from d-d and s-d interactions. We explore two types of band structures: a simplified “parabolic” band and a more realistic band structure calculated from first principles using VASP. Our Numerical results were obtained for transition metal hosts across the entire 5d series.