Phys.org  June 8, 2923 A team of researchers in the US (University of Minnesota, University of Utah, Argonne National Laboratory) demonstrated the ability to continuously tune the thermal conductivity of nanoscale films of La0.5Sr0.5CoO3-δ (LSCO) by a factor of over 5, via a room-temperature electrolyte-gate-induced non-volatile topotactic phase transformation from perovskite to an oxygen-vacancy-ordered brownmillerite phase accompanied by a metal-insulator transition. Combining time-domain thermoreflectance and electronic transport measurements, model analyses based on molecular dynamics and Boltzmann transport equation, and structural characterization by X-ray diffraction, they uncovered and deconvolved the effects of these transitions on heat carriers, including electrons and lattice […]