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Significant lattice thermal conductivity reduction following phase separation of the highly efficient Ge x Pb 1– x Te thermoelectric alloys
Author(s) -
Gelbstein Yaniv,
Davidow Joseph,
Leshem Ehud,
Pinshow Oren,
Moisa Strul
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
physica status solidi (b)
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.51
H-Index - 109
eISSN - 1521-3951
pISSN - 0370-1972
DOI - 10.1002/pssb.201451088
Subject(s) - thermoelectric effect , thermal conductivity , materials science , thermoelectric materials , lattice (music) , electrical resistivity and conductivity , thermal , condensed matter physics , thermodynamics , composite material , physics , quantum mechanics , acoustics
In an attempt to enhance the thermal to electrical conversion efficiency, novel complicated thermoelectric alloys are constantly reported. Most of these reports, correlate the low lattice thermal conductivity values, attributing to the enhanced efficiencies, to nanofeatures apparent in their systems. Yet, since most of the highly efficient thermoelectric materials ever reported are based on complicated alloys, a major reduction of the lattice thermal conductivity can be solely attributed to alloying/disordering effects. The current manuscript, explores by combined experimental and theoretical, using density functional theory and analytical modeling, approaches the lattice thermal conductivity values originated solely by alloying/disordering effects in the highly thermoelectrically efficient p‐type Ge x Pb 1– x Te alloys. By comparing these calculated results to various reported experimental values following different synthesis routes, it is shown that solution‐treated samples fit well to the calculated values while for phase‐separated samples, a significant lattice thermal conductivity reduction of ∼50% might be expected.