Studies on elemental tellurium under high pressure

Abstract

A non-linear behaviour in the resistance of tellurium as a function of pressure has been observed. At each pressure the resistance shows a time variation. At lower pressures, the normalized resistance increases with time, and at higher pressures, the normalized resistance decreases exponentially as a function of time. This change in behaviour with respect to time occurs in the region of the steepest descent in the resistance versus pressure plot. However, the magnitude of the change in the resistance with time is small compared to a change in the resistance with pressure. The origin of this behaviour is suggested to be linked with the generation and annealing of localized charged defects.