Thermal conductivity of TMPS₃ (TM=Fe, Ni, and Mn): role of a boundary scattering

Among various van der Waals (vdW) materials, a TMPS₃ (TM=Fe, Ni, Mn) group undergoes an antiferromagnetic transition at about 100 K, and hence can be an important magnetic layer in realizing multi-functional heterostructure. Although a thermal conduction through vdW materials is a fundamental issue in optimizing device performances, thermal properties of TMPS₃ has rarely been studied. In this work, we measured the thermal conductivity of TMPS₃ materials with a time-domain thermoreflectance method. We found that the cross-plane thermal conductivity of TMPS₃ is relatively low compared to other vdW materials, such as graphite and transition-metal dichalcognides. By comparing the temperature–dependent thermal conductivities of these materials, we demonstrated that effective boundaries caused by a stacking fault of vdW layers act as a main scattering channel in the heat conduction in these materials.