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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 February 2011
Hydridation of palladium (Pd) is accompanied by a substantial volume expansion. The electrical resistivity (ρ) would rise because the volume fraction of the hydride phase increases. However, if the material structure is porous/defective, hydridation induced volume expansion may lead to the closing of some pores/defects to result in a drop of ρ. We verified that a magnetron sputtered Pd film deposited at a higher argon ambient pressure (ϕ) was more defective, such that the contribution from the latter mechanism was stronger with increasing ϕ, and reached a maximum level for a film deposited at a ϕ of 6 mTorr. However, the film structure was weaker and unstable during the switching cycles, such that the magnitude of the change of ρ was found to increase successively with increasing number of switching cycles. The performances of ρ during initial soaking in H2 and subsequent hydridation and dehydridation switching cycles were different. The observed results are presented and discussed in this paper.