Magnetoresistance and thermopower of tellurium at high pressures up to 30 GPa

Measurements are reported of the transverse magnetoresistance MR and of the thermopower S, carried out at high pressures P on Te single crystals in synthetic-diamond chambers. The MR is found to increase with decreasing gas width under a pressure up to 4 GPa as one approaches the semiconductor-metal phase-transition point, to fall off subsequently in the high-pressure metallic phase. The behavior of S(P) correlates with the pressure dependences of the measured MR. A negative MR at T=77 K was found within a narrow interval P=1.5–2 GPa, where the valence band of Te is assumed to undergo rearrangement. Above the point of the phase transition to the β-Po structure, MR is established to increase with pressure for P>12 GPa. The MR data are used to estimate the hole mobility μ for various Te phases. A comparison is made of the mobilities in Te, Se, and high-pressure phases of mercury chalcogenides, which are their structural and electronic analogs, for pressures of up to 30 GPa.