Title: Highly Porous Thermoelectric Nanocomposites with Low Thermal Conductivity and High Figure of Merit from Large-Scale Solution-Synthesized Bi₂Te_2.5Se_0.5 Hollow Nanostructures

Abstract

To enhance the performance of thermoelectric materials and enable access to their widespread applications, it is beneficial yet challenging to synthesize hollow nanostructures in large quantities, with high porosity, low thermal conductivity (κ) and excellent figure of merit ($$z$$T). Herein we report a scalable (ca. 11.0 g per batch) and low-temperature colloidal processing route for Bi₂Te_2.5Se_0.5 hollow nanostructures. They are sintered into porous, bulk nanocomposites (phi 10 mm×h 10 mm) with low κ (0.48 W m^-1 K^-1) and the highest z T (1.18) among state-of-the-art Bi₂Te_3-xSe_x materilas. Additional benefits of the unprecedented low relative density (68–77 %) are the large demand reduction of raw materials and the improved portability. This method can be adopted to fabricate other porous phase-transition and thermoelectric chalcogenide materials and will pave the way for the implementation of hollow nanostructures in other fields.

Authors:

Xu, Biao ^[1]; Feng, Tianli ^[2]; Agne, Matthias T. ^[3]; Zhou, Lin ^[4]; Ruan, Xiulin ^[2]; Snyder, G. Jeffery ^[3]; Wu, Yue ^[1]

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+ Show Author Affiliations

1. Iowa State Univ., Ames, IA (United States). Dept. of Chemical and Biological Engineering; Ames Lab., Ames, IA (United States)
2. Purdue Univ., West Lafayette, IN (United States). Dept. of Mechanical Engineering
3. Northwestern Univ., Evanston, IL (United States). Dept. of Materials Science and Engineering
4. Ames Lab., Ames, IA (United States)

Publication Date:

Thu Jan 12 00:00:00 EST 2017

Research Org.:

Energy Frontier Research Centers (EFRC) (United States). Solid-State Solar-Thermal Energy Conversion Center (S3TEC)

Sponsoring Org.:

USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES); US Department of the Navy, Office of Naval Research (ONR); Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)

OSTI Identifier:

1470457

Alternate Identifier(s):

OSTI ID: 1401264

Grant/Contract Number:  

SC0001299; FG02-09ER46577; AC02-07CH11358

Resource Type:

Accepted Manuscript

Journal Name:

Angewandte Chemie (International Edition)

Additional Journal Information:

Journal Name: Angewandte Chemie (International Edition); Journal Volume: 56; Journal Issue: 13; Related Information: S3TEC partners with Massachusetts Institute of Technology (lead); Boston College; Oak Ridge National Laboratory; Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute; Journal ID: ISSN 1433-7851

Publisher:

Wiley

Country of Publication:

United States

Language:

English

Subject:

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE; 42 ENGINEERING; 77 NANOSCIENCE AND NANOTECHNOLOGY; hollow nanostructures; Kirkendall effect; porous nanocomposites; thermal conductivity; thermoelectric materials; solar (photovoltaic); solar (thermal); solid state lighting; phonons; thermoelectric; defects; mechanical behavior; charge transport; spin dynamics; materials and chemistry by design; optics; synthesis (novel materials); synthesis (self-assembly); synthesis (scalable processing)