Nonlinearity in regulating the metal to insulator transition of ReNiO3 towards low temperature range

Among the existing material family of the correlated oxides, the rare earth nickelates (ReNiO3) exhibit broadly adjustable metal to insulator transition (MIT) properties that enables correlated electronic applications, such as thermistors, thermochromics, and logical devices. Nevertheless, how to accurately control the critical temperature (TMIT) of ReNiO3 via the co-occupation of the rare-earth elements is yet worthy to be further explored. Herein, we demonstrate the non-linearity in adjusting the TMIT of ReNiO3 towards lower temperatures via introducing Pr co-occupation within ReNiO3 (e.g., PrxNd1-xNiO3 and PrxSm1-xNiO3) as synthesized by KCl molten-salt assisted high oxygen pressure reaction approach. Although the TMIT is effectively reduced via Pr substitution, it does not strictly follow a linear relationship, in particular, when there is large difference in the ionic radius of the co-occupation rare-earth elements. Furthermore, the most significant deviation in TMIT from the expected linear relationship appears at an equal co-occupation ratio of the two different rare-earth elements, while the abruption in the variation of resistivity across TMIT is also reduced. The present work highlights the importance to use adjacent rare-earth elements with co-occupation ratio away from 1:1 for achieving more linear adjustment in designing the metal to insulator transition properties for ReNiO3.