Liquidus temperatures of Hg-rich Hg-Cd-Te alloys

Measurements are made of the liquidus temperatures for ten (Hg/1-x/Cd)Te/1-y/ compositions in which x ranges from 0.091 to 0.401 and y ranges from 0.544 to 0.952. It is found that for metal-rich melts with the same x value, the liquidus temperature increases with y when y is in the range 0.5-0.7. This behavior is explained by the higher degree of association between Cd and Te than between Hg and Te in the melts. It is noted that recent calculated values of the liquidus isotherms by Tung et al. (1982) are in fair to good agreement with the experimental results obtained here.