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Progressive Regulation of Electrical and Thermal Transport Properties to High‐Performance CuInTe 2 Thermoelectric Materials
Author(s) -
Luo Yubo,
Yang Junyou,
Jiang Qinghui,
Li Weixin,
Zhang Dan,
Zhou Zhiwei,
Cheng Yudong,
Ren Yangyang,
He Xu
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
advanced energy materials
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 10.08
H-Index - 220
eISSN - 1614-6840
pISSN - 1614-6832
DOI - 10.1002/aenm.201600007
Subject(s) - materials science , thermoelectric effect , thermoelectric materials , electrical resistivity and conductivity , seebeck coefficient , phonon scattering , thermal conductivity , chemical engineering , nanotechnology , optoelectronics , analytical chemistry (journal) , composite material , thermodynamics , organic chemistry , electrical engineering , chemistry , physics , engineering
p‐type CuInTe 2 thermoelectric (TE) materials are of great interest for applications in the middle temperature range because of their environmentally benign chemical component and stable phase under operating temperatures. In order to enhance their TE performance to compete with the Pb based TE materials, a progressive regulation of electrical and thermal transport properties has been employed in this work. Anion P and Sb substitution is used to tune the electrical transport properties of CuInTe 2 for the first time, leading to a sharp enhancement in power factor due to the reduction of electrical resistivity by acceptor doping and the increase of the Seebeck coefficient resulted from the improvement of density of states. Concurrently, In 2 O 3 nanoinclusions are introduced through an in situ oxidation between CuInTe 2 and ZnO additives, rendering a great reduction in the thermal conductivity of CuInTe 2 by the extra phonon scattering. Then, by integrating the anion substitution and nanoinclusions, a high power factor of 1445 μW m −1 K −2 and enhanced ZT of 1.61 at 823 K are achieved in the CuInTe 2 based TE material. This implies that the synergistic regulation of electrical and thermal transport properties by anion substitution and in situ nanostructure is a very effective approach to improve the TE performance of CuInTe 2 compounds.