Enhancing Thermoelectric Properties of (CuTe)-(BiCuTeO) Composites by Optimizing Carrier Concentration

Overview

Journal Materials (Basel)

Publisher MDPI

Date 2022 Mar 25

PMID 35329548

Authors

Wenyu Zhang

Zhifang Zhou

Yueyang Yang

Yunpeng Zheng

Yushuai Xu

Mingchu Zou

Ce-Wen Nan

Yuan-Hua Lin

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Because of the high carrier concentration, copper telluride (CuTe) has a relatively low Seebeck coefficient and high thermal conductivity, which are not good for its thermoelectric performance. To simultaneously optimize carrier concentration, lower thermal conductivity and improve the stability, BiCuTeO, an oxygen containing compound with lower carrier concentration, is in situ formed in CuTe by a method of combining self-propagating high-temperature synthesis (SHS) with spark plasma sintering (SPS). With the incorporation of BiCuTeO, the carrier concentration decreased from 8.1 × 10 to 3.8 × 10 cm, bringing the increase of power factor from ~1.91 to ~2.97 μW cm K at normal temperature. At the same time, thermal conductivity reduced from 2.61 to 1.48 W m K at 623 K. Consequently, (CuTe)-(BiCuTeO) composite sample reached a relatively high value of 0.13 at 723 K, which is 41% higher than that of CuTe.

References

Zeier W, Zevalkink A, Gibbs Z, Hautier G, Kanatzidis M, Snyder G . Thinking Like a Chemist: Intuition in Thermoelectric Materials. Angew Chem Int Ed Engl. 2016; 55(24):6826-41. DOI: 10.1002/anie.201508381. View

Pei Y, Shi X, LaLonde A, Wang H, Chen L, Snyder G . Convergence of electronic bands for high performance bulk thermoelectrics. Nature. 2011; 473(7345):66-9. DOI: 10.1038/nature09996. View

Zhu T, Liu Y, Fu C, Heremans J, Snyder J, Zhao X . Compromise and Synergy in High-Efficiency Thermoelectric Materials. Adv Mater. 2017; 29(14). DOI: 10.1002/adma.201605884. View

Tan G, Zhao L, Kanatzidis M . Rationally Designing High-Performance Bulk Thermoelectric Materials. Chem Rev. 2016; 116(19):12123-12149. DOI: 10.1021/acs.chemrev.6b00255. View

Shi X, Chen L . Thermoelectric materials step up. Nat Mater. 2016; 15(7):691-2. DOI: 10.1038/nmat4643. View

Park D, Ju H, Oh T, Kim J . Facile fabrication of one-dimensional Te/CuTe nanorod composites with improved thermoelectric power factor and low thermal conductivity. Sci Rep. 2018; 8(1):18082. PMC: 6305380. DOI: 10.1038/s41598-018-35713-9. View

Sarkar S, Sarswat P, Saini S, Mele P, Free M . Synergistic effect of band convergence and carrier transport on enhancing the thermoelectric performance of Ga doped CuTe at medium temperatures. Sci Rep. 2019; 9(1):8180. PMC: 6547728. DOI: 10.1038/s41598-019-43911-2. View

Zhou Z, Chai Y, Ikuta Y, Lee Y, Lin Y, Kimura Y . Reduced Thermal Conductivity of Mg(Si, Sn) Solid Solutions by a Gradient Composition Layered Microstructure. ACS Appl Mater Interfaces. 2020; 12(17):19547-19552. DOI: 10.1021/acsami.0c02549. View

Snyder G, Toberer E . Complex thermoelectric materials. Nat Mater. 2008; 7(2):105-14. DOI: 10.1038/nmat2090. View

10.

Shi X, Zou J, Chen Z . Advanced Thermoelectric Design: From Materials and Structures to Devices. Chem Rev. 2020; 120(15):7399-7515. DOI: 10.1021/acs.chemrev.0c00026. View

11.

Venkatasubramanian R, Siivola E, Colpitts T, OQuinn B . Thin-film thermoelectric devices with high room-temperature figures of merit. Nature. 2001; 413(6856):597-602. DOI: 10.1038/35098012. View

12.

Ren G, Wang S, Zhou Z, Li X, Yang J, Zhang W . Complex electronic structure and compositing effect in high performance thermoelectric BiCuSeO. Nat Commun. 2019; 10(1):2814. PMC: 6597697. DOI: 10.1038/s41467-019-10476-7. View

13.

He W, Wang D, Wu H, Xiao Y, Zhang Y, He D . High thermoelectric performance in low-cost SnSSe crystals. Science. 2019; 365(6460):1418-1424. DOI: 10.1126/science.aax5123. View

14.

Hicks , Dresselhaus . Effect of quantum-well structures on the thermoelectric figure of merit. Phys Rev B Condens Matter. 1993; 47(19):12727-12731. DOI: 10.1103/physrevb.47.12727. View

15.

Heremans J, Jovovic V, Toberer E, Saramat A, Kurosaki K, Charoenphakdee A . Enhancement of thermoelectric efficiency in PbTe by distortion of the electronic density of states. Science. 2008; 321(5888):554-7. DOI: 10.1126/science.1159725. View

16.

Wu H, Zhao L, Zheng F, Wu D, Pei Y, Tong X . Broad temperature plateau for thermoelectric figure of merit ZT>2 in phase-separated PbTe0.7S0.3. Nat Commun. 2014; 5:4515. DOI: 10.1038/ncomms5515. View

17.

Zhao K, Liu K, Yue Z, Wang Y, Song Q, Li J . Are Cu Te-Based Compounds Excellent Thermoelectric Materials?. Adv Mater. 2019; 31(49):e1903480. DOI: 10.1002/adma.201903480. View

18.

Biswas K, He J, Blum I, Wu C, Hogan T, Seidman D . High-performance bulk thermoelectrics with all-scale hierarchical architectures. Nature. 2012; 489(7416):414-8. DOI: 10.1038/nature11439. View

19.

Roychowdhury S, Ghosh T, Arora R, Samanta M, Xie L, Singh N . Enhanced atomic ordering leads to high thermoelectric performance in AgSbTe. Science. 2021; 371(6530):722-727. DOI: 10.1126/science.abb3517. View