Pressure is an external tuning parameter that modifies materials’ properties and can stabilize new, and sometimes exotic, phases. To truly understand how these exotic states form, it is essential to accurately determine the pressures applied to the materials of
interest over a wide range of temperatures. Regardless of the pressure-transmitting medium (gas, liquid, or solid powder), the pressure is typically determined by measuring of a physical quantity of a reference system (manometer) where the pressure dependence of a specific physical quantity is pre-characterized. There is a surprising gap in reference materials for pressures up to 2 GPa in the range of temperatures from 1.8 to 300 K. In this work, the resistance measurements of manganin were carried out in a 4He-gas pressure setup under pressures up to ∼0.8 GPa and a hybrid piston-cylinder cell to ∼2.0 GPa. These data provided accurate determination of the temperature and pressure dependence of the resistivity of manganin. In addition, a practical approach to estimate the pressure value at any given temperature below room temperature in a piston-cylinder cell is described. This work is enabling robust monitoring of pressure changes in pressure cells crucial for accurate properties measurements of emergent quantum states, such as superconductivity, over cryogenic temperatures and pressures up to 2 GPa.
Li Xiang, Elena Gati, Sergey L. Bud’ko, Raquel A. Ribeiro, Arif Ata, Ulrich Tutsch, Michael Lang, Paul C. Canfield, “Characterization of the pressure coefficient of manganin and temperature evolution of pressure in piston-cylinder cell” Review of Scientific Instruments, 91, 095103 (2020). doi: 10.1063/5.0022650