The Thermoelectric Properties of Sputtered films of Gold, Platinum, and Palladium; and of Solid Palladium containing Occluded Hydrogen

Thermoelectric properties of sputtered films of gold, platinum and palladium.—The films were sputtered on glass in a tube containing air not specially dried, the desired shapes being secured by use of mica screens. One end of a film was kept at 0°C; the temperature of the other junction was varied by use of an electrically heated oil bath. For monometallic couples of Au, Pt and Pd, each consisting of a film in contact with its mother metal, surprisingly large electromotive forces were observed. For the unbaked films the power line shows breaks and the values decrease with time. If the films are baked at 500° C, however, the electromotive forces are definite though smaller and the power lines are straight, the values of $\frac{\mathrm{dE}}{d\theta }$ for the baked films with respect to the mother metal for the range 0° to 300° C, increasing from -.90 to -1.23 for gold, and from 6.59 to 9.6 for Pd, and being constant at 3.46 for Pt, all in microvolts per degree. These values do not vary with the thickness, and agree with the results obtained with Pt film-Au film couples.