Approximant phases and an icosahedral quasicrystal in the Ca-Au-Ga system: the influence of size of gallium versus indium.

Two crystalline approximants (ACs) and their corresponding icosahedral quasicrystal (i-QC) are obtained in the Ca-Au-Ga system through conventional solid-state exploratory syntheses. Single crystal structural analyses reveal that the 1/1 AC, Ca 3Au x Ga 19- x ( x = approximately 9.3-12.1) [ Im3, a = 14.6941(6)-14.7594(6) A], has the empty cubes in the prototypic YCd 6 (= Y 3Cd 18) now fully occupied by Ga, resulting in a 3:19 stoichiometry. In parallel, the distorted cubes in the 2/1 AC, Ca 13Au 57.1Ga 23.4 [ Pa3, a = 23.9377(8) A] are fully or fractionally occupied by Ga. The valence electron count per atom ( e/ a) for the 2/1 AC (1.64) is smaller than that over the 1/1 AC composition range (1.76-2.02), and the e/ a of the Ca 15.2Au 50.3Ga 34.5 i-QC, 1.84, is somewhat distant from typical values for Tsai-type i-QCs ( approximately 2.0). Comparisons of the gallium results with the corresponding In phases suggest that the structural differences result mainly from size rather than electronic factors. The 1/1 and 2/1 appear to be thermodynamically stable on slow cooling, as usual, whereas the i-QC isolated by quenching decomposes on heating at approximately 660 degrees C, mainly into 2/1 AC and Ca 3(Au,Ga) 11. Calculations of the electronic structure of 1/1 AC suggest that the Fermi sphere-Brillouin zone interactions remain important for the Ca-Au-Ga i-QC.