Room-temperature Coulomb oscillation of a proton dot in Ni-Nb-Zr-H glassy alloys with nanofarad capacitance

A dc-induced voltage oscillation was observed at room temperature in (Ni₃₆Nb₂₄Zr₄₀) 90.1 H9.9 glassy alloy ribbons of about 1 mm width and 30 μm thickness and an electrode distance of 20 mm. The I-V characteristic provided evidence of the Coulomb staircase at ∼300 K, suggesting the existence of macroscopic proton dot tunneling along the Zr(Nb)-H - H-Zr(Nb) atomic bond array, where is the vacancy barrier among clusters. The frequency decreased remarkably with increasing capacitance (C) and resistance (R) at room temperature. Thus the (Ni₃₆Nb₂₄Zr ₄₀) 90.1 H9.9 glassy alloy can be regarded as a dc/ac converting device with a large number of nanofarad capacitance.