High-Pressure Induced Transformations in Eu–Zn–As Zintl Pnictides

This research proposal is dedicated to exploring the structural properties of Eu–Zn–As Zintl Pnictides (ZPs) under high-pressure (HP) conditions. The impact of HP on the structure and properties of these perspective quantum materials is poorly studied, although HP is often used to prepare bulk thermoelectric and to improve transport properties of materials.We propose to investigate following unreported yet ZPs within Eu–Zn–As phase space with different dimensionalities of polyanionic frameworks: Eu17Zn5As18 (0D), Eu3Zn2As4 (1D), and β-Eu2ZnAs2 (1D) and α-Eu2ZnAs2 (0D) under pressures up to 50 GPa. Single-crystal X-ray diffraction (SCXRD) studies under hydrostatic pressure will help us to provide insight into tunability mechanism within Zintl polyanionic frameworks of different dimensionalities under hydrostatic pressures. Followed by the physical property measurements, we aim to establish structure-property relationships necessary for designing novel quantum materials.