Effects of nonframework metal cations and phonon scattering mechanisms on the thermal transport properties of polycrystalline zeolite LTA films

We present a systematic study to investigate the effects of nonframework cations and the role of phonon scattering mechanisms on the thermal transport properties of zeolite LTA, via experiment and semiempirical lattice dynamics calculations. Our study is motivated by the increasing interest in accurate measurements and mechanistic understanding of the thermal transport properties of zeolite materials. The presence of a nanostructured pore network, extra-framework cations, and tunable framework structure and composition confer interesting thermophysical properties to these materials, making them a good model system to investigate thermal transport in complex materials. Continuous films of zeolite LTA with different nonframework cations Na+, K+, and Ca+2 were synthesized and characterized. The thermal conductivity was measured using the three-omega method over a wide range of temperature 150–450 K . These are the first thermal conductivity measurements performed on bulk LTA, so they are more accurate than previous measurements, which involved the use of compacted zeolite powders. Our data showed significant dependence of the thermal conductivity on the extra-framework cations as well the temperature. The thermal conductivities of the zeolite LTA samples were modeled with the relaxation time approximation to the Boltzmann transport equation. The full phonon spectra for each type of LTA zeolite were calculated and used in conjunction with semiempirical relaxation time expressions to calculate the thermal conductivity. The results both validated, and suggested the limitations of, this modeling approach. Optical phonons dominated the thermal conductivity and boundarylike scattering was found to be the strongest phonon scattering mechanism, as also observed in MFI zeolite. © 2010 American Institute of Physics. doi:10.1063/1.3327419