A review of thermoelectric cooling: Materials, modeling and applications Zhao, Dongliang; Tan, Gang 42 ENGINEERING; AIR CONDITIONING; AUTOMOBILES; COOLING SYSTEMS; DESIGN; DIRECT CURRENT; ONE-DIMENSIONAL CALCULATIONS; REFRIGERATION; RELIABILITY; SIMULATION; TEMPERATURE CONTROL; THERMOELECTRIC COOLERS; THERMOELECTRIC MATERIALS; THERMOELECTRIC REFRIGERATORS; THREE-DIMENSIONAL CALCULATIONS; WORKING FLUIDS This study reviews the recent advances of thermoelectric materials, modeling approaches, and applications. Thermoelectric cooling systems have advantages over conventional cooling devices, including compact in size, light in weight, high reliability, no mechanical moving parts, no working fluid, being powered by direct current, and easily switching between cooling and heating modes. In this study, historical development of thermoelectric cooling has been briefly introduced first. Next, the development of thermoelectric materials has been given and the achievements in past decade have been summarized. To improve thermoelectric cooling system's performance, the modeling techniques have been described for both the thermoelement modeling and thermoelectric cooler (TEC) modeling including standard simplified energy equilibrium model, one-dimensional and three-dimensional models, and numerical compact model. Finally, the thermoelectric cooling applications have been reviewed in aspects of domestic refrigeration, electronic cooling, scientific application, and automobile air conditioning and seat temperature control, with summaries for the commercially available thermoelectric modules and thermoelectric refrigerators. It is expected that this study will be beneficial to thermoelectric cooling system design, simulation, and analysis. - Highlights: •Thermoelectric cooling has great prospects with thermoelectric material's advances. •Modeling techniques for both thermoelement and TEC have been reviewed. •Principle thermoelectric cooling applications have been reviewed and summarized. Available from http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.applthermaleng.2014.01.074 United Kingdom 2014-05-01 English Journal Article Journal Name: Applied Thermal Engineering; Journal Volume: 66; Journal Issue: 1-2; Other Information: Copyright (c) 2014 Elsevier Science B.V., Amsterdam, The Netherlands, All rights reserved.; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Medium: X; Size: page(s) 15-24 https://doi.org/10.1016/J.APPLTHERMALENG.2014.01.074 PII: S1359-4311(14)00085-4 [] 1-2 66 Journal ID: ISSN 1359-4311; CODEN: ATENFT; Other: PII: S1359-4311(14)00085-4; TRN: GB15R0701022245 INIS 2015-03-19 22316048