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Title: Rapid Stoichiometry Control in Cu2Se Thin Films for Room-Temperature Power Factor Improvement

Journal Article · · ACS Applied Energy Materials
 [1];  [2];  [3];  [1];  [4];  [3];  [5];  [6]; ORCiD logo [7]; ORCiD logo [5]; ORCiD logo [1]
  1. NYU Tandon School of Engineering, Brooklyn, NY (United States)
  2. Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States). Molecular Foundry; Stevens Institute of Technology, Hoboken, NJ (United States)
  3. Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States). Molecular Foundry; Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA (United States)
  4. NYU Tandon School of Engineering, Brooklyn, NY (United States); Cooper Union, New York, NY (United States). Dept. of Chemical Engineering
  5. Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States). Molecular Foundry
  6. Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
  7. Advanced Light Source, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, California 94720, United States

Cu2Se thin films provide a promising route toward relatively safe, sustainable and solution processed thermoelectric (TE) modules in contrast to more expensive and toxic materials currently on the market such as Bi2Te3. Cu2Se is known in the TE community for its high performance at high temperature and has recently attracted attention from its large theoretically predicted figure of merit at room temperature. Unfortunately, one of the main limitations encountered so far in Cu2Se thin films is that the carrier concentrations are not optimized for TE operation after solution processing. In this work, we conduct a comprehensive study of the structural, optical, and TE properties of Cu2Se thin films and demonstrate that nonoptimized carrier concentrations in these films lead to observations of poor performance at room temperature. Through a simple soaking procedure in a Cu+ ion solution for only a few minutes, we demonstrate a 200-300% increase in power factor. This soaking process pushes the carrier concentration of the Cu2Se thin film toward its optimal value for TE operation and marks the highest TE performance for any solution processed Cu2Se thin film at room temperature thus far. If the performance can be further optimized at room temperature, Cu2Se thin films will be the material of choice to utilize in TE modules for powering miniature electronics and sensors, which has been an increasingly popular and rapidly expanding market.

Research Organization:
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
National Science Foundation (NSF); USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES)
Grant/Contract Number:
AC02-05CH11231
OSTI ID:
1656501
Journal Information:
ACS Applied Energy Materials, Journal Name: ACS Applied Energy Materials Journal Issue: 2 Vol. 2; ISSN 2574-0962
Publisher:
American Chemical Society (ACS)Copyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

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Cited By (1)

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