Thermal Conductivity in

metals

By
SHAHZAIB SHAHID
When a Metallic wire is heated from both ends with different
temperature the heat flows from the hot end to cold end

Heat Current The amount of thermal energy crossing

unit area per unit time .

heat Current is proportional to temperature gradient

Thermal
Conductivity
 Heat is carried Entirely
In Insulators By Phonons

In Metals Heat is carried by :

i) Electrons
ii) Phonons

In most metals the concentration of electrons exceeds Phonons so we

can ignore the participation of phonons
Suppose the process of heat conduction as shown in Figure

Left Side ------Electrons has more energy

Right side------Electrons has low energy
Electrons move from left to right to transport energy ,Also some
electrons move from right to left but these electrons has low
energy do net energy transfer is by Left sided Electrons .

Energy is transferred by electrons near Fermi Levels

and no energy is transfer by Electrons below Fermi
Levels .
To evaluate thermal conductivity we use the formula: