Specific Heat of Ultrafine Particles of Ag Prepared by the Gas Evaporation Technique

Abstract

The specific heat of softly packed ultrafine particles of silver was measured by means of scanning calorimetry in the temperature range from 50°C to 200°C.
Measurement was done six times with a specimen in the same temperature range and the same value of the specific heat almost independent of the temperature was obtained except for the case of the first measurement in which the exothermic reaction due to sintering of particles was observed.
Measured specific heat was larger than that of bulk silver by 3–5 J/mol·K. This excess value is interpreted in terms of the lattice vibration modified by the interation with the neighbor grains such as van der Waals’.