Structure evolution and corresponding electrical properties in weakly bound Co-C60 mixture

Sakai, Seiji; Naramoto, Hiroshi; Xu, Y.; Priyanto, T. H.; Lavrentiev, V.; Narumi, Kazumasa

Mixture films between cobalt and C (CoxC, x = 0.5-700) were prepared by co-evaporation technique under UHV conditions. The composition-dependent features of dilatation and downshift of Raman peak suggest that the mixtures are composed of cobalt particles and a C-based phase in which certain number of cobalt atoms are coordinated with C molecules. It is deduced that the equilibrated number of cobalt atoms in the C-based phase is 4 atoms per C molecule and in which an electron transfer occurs from a cobalt atom to a C molecule. The evaluation of their temperature dependences reveals that: (1) The mixtures with x 4 are thermally activated-type, and their conductive nature can be attributed to the C-based phase. Further (2) the mixtures between 4 x 60 are also thermally activated, however, the electron hopping process between the isolated cobalt particles is supposed to be operative (variable-range-hopping). And (3) in the mixtures with x 60 which corresponds to a percolation threshold for cobalt particles, the system changes into metallic conduction.