Ionic thermocurrents as a tool for defect spectroscopy in ionic solids

ITC technique has been extensively used in different countries to study ionic polarization effects in a wide class of materials. The results, obtained over twenty years and reviewed here, stressed it as a powerful tool for performing defect spectroscopy which 1) ranges from simple point defects to clusters, large defect occlusions and dislocations and 2) deals with different relaxation mechanisms (dipole reorientation, ionic space charge, Maxwell-Wagner polarization, air-gap blocked ionic conductivity). The technique, used at the beginning to investigate sophisticated phenomena in model systems, such as alkali halides, has been later exploited to analyze defects in more complex materials of technological interest.