221 research outputs found
Thermoelectric prospects of nanomaterials with spin-orbit surface bands
Nanostructured composites and nanowire arrays of traditional thermoelectrics
like Bi, Bi(1-x)Sb(x) and Bi(2)Te(3) have metallic Rashba surface spin-orbit
bands featuring high mobilities rivaling that of the bulk for which topological
insulator behavior has been proposed. Nearly pure surface electronic transport
has been observed at low temperatures in Bi nanowires with diameter around the
critical diameter, 50 nm, for the semimetal-to semiconductor transition. The
surface contributes strongly to the thermopower, actually dominating for
temperatures T < 100 K in these nanowires. The surface thermopower was found to
be -1 T microvolt/(K^2), a value that is consistent with theory. We show that
surface electronic transport together with boundary phonon scattering leads to
enhanced thermoelectric performance at low temperatures of Bi nanowire arrays.
We compare with bulk n-BiSb alloys, optimized CsBi(4)Te(6) and optimized
Bi(2)Te(3). Surface dominated electronic transport can be expected in
nanomaterials of the other traditional thermoelectrics.Comment: 18 pages, 3 figure
Thermoelectric properties of the bismuth telluride nanowires in the constant-relaxation-time approximation
Electronic structure of bismuth telluride nanowires with the growth
directions [110] and [015] is studied in the framework of anisotropic effective
mass method using the parabolic band approximation. The components of the
electron and hole effective mass tensor for six valleys are calculated for both
growth directions. For a square nanowire, in the temperature range from 77 K to
500 K, the dependence of the Seebeck coefficient, the electron thermal and
electrical conductivity as well as the figure of merit ZT on the nanowire
thickness and on the excess hole concentration are investigated in the
constant-relaxation-time approximation. The carrier confinement is shown to
play essential role for square nanowires with thickness less than 30 nm. The
confinement decreases both the carrier concentration and the thermal
conductivity but increases the maximum value of Seebeck coefficient in contrast
to the excess holes (impurities). The confinement effect is stronger for the
direction [015] than for the direction [110] due to the carrier mass difference
for these directions. The carrier confinement increases maximum value of ZT and
shifts it towards high temperatures. For the p-type bismuth telluride nanowires
with growth direction [110], the maximum value of the figure of merit is equal
to 1.3, 1.6, and 2.8, correspondingly, at temperatures 310 K, 390 K, 480 K and
the nanowire thicknesses 30 nm, 15 nm, and 7 nm. At the room temperature, the
figure of merit equals 1.2, 1.3, and 1.7, respectively.Comment: 13 pages, 7 figures, 2 tables, typos added, added references for
sections 2-
Pressure effects on the transport coefficients of Ba(Fe1-xCox)2As2
We report the temperature dependence of the resistivity and thermoelectric
power under hydrostatic pressure of the itinerant antiferromagnet BaFe2As2 and
the electron-doped superconductor Ba(Fe0.9Co0.1)2As2. We observe a hole-like
contribution to the thermopower below the structural-magnetic transition in the
parent compound that is suppressed in magnitude and temperature with pressure.
Pressure increases the contribution of electrons to transport in both the doped
and undoped compound. In the 10% Co-doped sample, we used a two-band model for
thermopower to estimate the carrier concentrations and determine the effect of
pressure on the band structure
Thermoelectric Figure of Merit of Strongly Correlated Superlattice Semiconductors
We solved the Anderson Lattice Hamiltonian to get the energy bands of a
strongly correlated semiconductor by using slave boson mean field theory. The
transport properties were calculated in the relaxation-time approximation,and
the thermoelectric figure of merit was obtained for the strongly correlated
semiconductor and its superlattice structures. We found that at room
temperature can reach nearly 2 for the quantum wire lattice structure.We
believe that it is possible to find high values of thermoelectric figure of
merit from strongly correlated semiconductor superlattice systems.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure
A simple model for the vibrational modes in honeycomb lattices
The classical lattice dynamics of honeycomb lattices is studied in the
harmonic approximation. Interactions between nearest neighbors are represented
by springs connecting them. A short and necessary introduction of the lattice
structure is presented. The dynamical matrix of the vibrational modes is then
derived, and its eigenvalue problem is solved analytically. The solution may
provide deeper insight into the nature of the vibrational modes. Numerical
results for the vibrational frequencies are presented. To show that how
effective our method used for the case of honeycomb lattice is, we also apply
it to triangular and square lattice structures. A few suggested problems are
listed in the concluding section.Comment: 9 pages, 12 figures, submitted to American Journal of Physic
Pressure-induced phase transition of Bi2Te3 into the bcc structure
The pressure-induced phase transition of bismuth telluride, Bi2Te3, has been
studied by synchrotron x-ray diffraction measurements at room temperature using
a diamond-anvil cell (DAC) with loading pressures up to 29.8 GPa. We found a
high-pressure body-centered cubic (bcc) phase in Bi2Te3 at 25.2 GPa, which is
denoted as phase IV, and this phase apperars above 14.5 GPa. Upon releasing the
pressure from 29.8 GPa, the diffraction pattern changes with pressure
hysteresis. The original rhombohedral phase is recovered at 2.43 GPa. The bcc
structure can explain the phase IV peaks. We assumed that the structural model
of phase IV is analogous to a substitutional binary alloy; the Bi and Te atoms
are distributed in the bcc-lattice sites with space group Im-3m. The results of
Rietveld analysis based on this model agree well with both the experimental
data and calculated results. Therefore, the structure of phase IV in Bi2Te3 can
be explained by a solid solution with a bcc lattice in the Bi-Te (60 atomic%
tellurium) binary system.Comment: 12 pages, 5 figure
Giant Anharmonic Phonon Scattering in PbTe
Understanding the microscopic processes affecting the bulk thermal
conductivity is crucial to develop more efficient thermoelectric materials.
PbTe is currently one of the leading thermoelectric materials, largely thanks
to its low thermal conductivity. However, the origin of this low thermal
conductivity in a simple rocksalt structure has so far been elusive. Using a
combination of inelastic neutron scattering measurements and first-principles
computations of the phonons, we identify a strong anharmonic coupling between
the ferroelectric transverse optic (TO) mode and the longitudinal acoustic (LA)
modes in PbTe. This interaction extends over a large portion of reciprocal
space, and directly affects the heat-carrying LA phonons. The LA-TO anharmonic
coupling is likely to play a central role in explaining the low thermal
conductivity of PbTe. The present results provide a microscopic picture of why
many good thermoelectric materials are found near a lattice instability of the
ferroelectric type
An efficient algorithm to calculate intrinsic thermoelectric parameters based on Landauer approach
The Landauer approach provides a conceptually simple way to calculate the
intrinsic thermoelectric (TE) parameters of materials from the ballistic to the
diffusive transport regime. This method relies on the calculation of the number
of propagating modes and the scattering rate for each mode. The modes are
calculated from the energy dispersion (E(k)) of the materials which require
heavy computation and often supply energy relation on sparse momentum (k)
grids. Here an efficient method to calculate the distribution of modes (DOM)
from a given E(k) relationship is presented. The main features of this
algorithm are, (i) its ability to work on sparse dispersion data, and (ii)
creation of an energy grid for the DOM that is almost independent of the
dispersion data therefore allowing for efficient and fast calculation of TE
parameters. The inclusion of scattering effects is also straight forward. The
effect of k-grid sparsity on the compute time for DOM and on the sensitivity of
the calculated TE results are provided. The algorithm calculates the TE
parameters within 5% accuracy when the K-grid sparsity is increased up to 60%
for all the dimensions (3D, 2D and 1D). The time taken for the DOM calculation
is strongly influenced by the transverse K density (K perpendicular to
transport direction) but is almost independent of the transport K density
(along the transport direction). The DOM and TE results from the algorithm are
bench-marked with, (i) analytical calculations for parabolic bands, and (ii)
realistic electronic and phonon results for .Comment: 16 Figures, 3 Tables, submitted to Journal of Computational
electronic
Glass-Like Heat Conduction in High-Mobility Crystalline Semiconductors
The thermal conductivity of polycrystalline semiconductors with type-I
clathrate hydrate crystal structure is reported. Ge clathrates (doped with Sr
and/or Eu) exhibit lattice thermal conductivities typical of amorphous
materials. Remarkably, this behavior occurs in spite of the well-defined
crystalline structure and relatively high electron mobility (). The dynamics of dopant ions and their interaction with the
polyhedral cages of the structure are a likely source of the strong phonon
scattering.Comment: 4 pages, 3 postscript figures, to be published, Phys. Rev. Let
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