Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Determining The Temperature-Dependent Characteristic Temperature Of Beryllium From Electrical Resistance Measurements, Thomas W. Listerman, Xiao-Li Zhou

Thomas Listerman

We have developed an intermediate-level laboratory experiment to determine the temperature- dependent characteristic temperature of beryllium. The apparatus used to measure the resistance of a beryllium wire sample between liquid nitrogen and room temperatures was simple. The characteristic temperatures obtained from these data using the Block-Grüneisen model are in reasonable agreement with literature values obtained from resistivity and heat capacity experiments. The experiment introduced students to cryogenic and computer data analysis techniques and forced them to extend their knowledge of the theory of electrical resistance and of characteristic temperatures.