Managing heat flow is crucial for many advanced technologies. It plays an important role in electronic cooling systems that function without moving parts, devices that convert heat into electricity, chip-based circuits in modern electronics, and cogeneration systems that capture and reuse industrial heat.

Figure 1. Scientists Learn to Control Heat Flow Using Electricity.

Ensuring heat moves in the right way allows these systems to operate with maximum efficiency and performance. Figure 1 shows Scientists Learn to Control Heat Flow Using Electricity.

With fewer disruptions, these vibrations can travel farther through the material—similar to traffic flowing more smoothly when congestion is reduced. This improved movement of phonons strengthens heat conduction in the direction of the electric field and ultimately enhances overall efficiency.

Neutron Experiments Reveal Atomic Motion

The experiments were conducted at the Spallation Neutron Source, a user facility of the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science located at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL).

Scientists used advanced inelastic neutron scattering techniques to study both the structure of the material—how atoms are arranged—and its dynamics, meaning how those atoms move. Neutrons allow researchers to identify where atoms sit within a crystal and how they vibrate over time. This approach builds on the Nobel Prize–winning discoveries of Clifford Shull and Bertram Brockhouse.

Data gathered at the facility provided detailed insight into how an electric field influences phonons, the tiny vibrations that carry heat through materials. The findings show that the electric field not only speeds up these vibrations but also increases how long they persist. Both changes significantly improve the transport of heat.

The researchers focused on a specialized ceramic material known as relaxor-based ferroelectrics. When an electric field is applied, small electric charges inside the material align with the field. This alignment reduces the scattering that normally interrupts heat-carrying vibrations, allowing energy to travel more efficiently through the crystal.

The crystals used in the study were carefully grown and then exposed to an electric field in a process called poling, carried out by Raffi Sahul at Amphenol Corporation. The resulting materials enabled precise control over how energy moves through the solid.

ORNL senior researcher Michael Manley designed and led the neutron scattering experiments with ORNL senior R&D staff member Raphaël Hermann.

Earlier studies on bulk ferroelectric materials had improved thermal conductivity by only about 5–10 percent, but the new measurements showed an increase close to 300 percent. According to Manley, this dramatic improvement occurs mainly because phonons can travel much farther through the material before stopping.

Connecting Heat Flow to Atomic Vibrations

By combining thermal conductivity measurements with neutron scattering results, the team directly linked changes in heat transport to the behavior of atomic vibrations inside the crystal.

The late professor Joseph Heremans of The Ohio State University developed the thermal conductivity experiments and guided doctoral researcher Delaram Rashadfar during the analysis of the results.

Rashadfar noted that earlier work suggested only a modest improvement might occur. Instead, the team observed a threefold increase, which turned out to be a significant discovery. She added that Heremans often emphasized trusting the experimental data first and allowing theory to follow afterward.

Source:SciTECHDaily

Cite this article:

Priyadharshini S (2026), New Technique Lets Scientists Direct Heat Flow with Electricity, AnaTechMaz, pp. 367