Abstract
The relation between two well known charge-density-wave (CDW) transport phenomena, namely the apparent increase in the threshold field ET for continuous Frohlich conduction in short specimens, and the memory effect seen when the direction of current flow is reversed, is investigated in experiments on NbSe3 at temperatures T between 59 and 114 K. The experiments show that the processes of phase-slip that occur near the current terminals during continuous Frohlich conduction are initiated thermally, probably by the creation of a vortex, and are responsible also for relaxing the metastable distortion of the CDW that remains after current ceases.