TY - GEN
T1 - Enhancement of thermoelectric figure of merit of Bi2Te3 using carbon dots
AU - Celik, Emrah
AU - Oztan, Cagri
AU - Zhou, Yiqun
AU - LeBlanc, Roger
AU - Genc, Oguz
AU - Ballikaya, Sedat
N1 - Funding Information:
This project is funded by University of Miami CRI-FICMS award. S.B also acknowledges support provided by the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TUBITAK) under the Project Number 115F510 and Scientific Research Projects Coordination Unit of Istanbul University with project number of 21890 and 20611.
PY - 2018
Y1 - 2018
N2 - Thermoelectric (TE) energy harvesters are multi-material solid-state devices that convert heat (i.e. a thermal gradient) directly into electric potential. Currently, the biggest challenge limiting the applications of thermoelectric devices is the low conversion efficiency (<10%). To achieve higher thermoelectric efficiency, electrical conductivity and Seebeck coefficient of thermoelectric materials must be maximized allowing the flow of charge carriers and thermal conductivity must be minimized keeping high temperature gradient between hot and cold sides. These properties are strongly coupled to each other. In other words, improving one property deteriorates the other. In nanoscale however, manipulation of matter at the atomic level can decouple these properties. Nanoengineering is therefore considered to be the only remedy for the low conversion efficiency of thermoelectric materials. Current nanomanipulation techniques focus only on reducing thermal conductivity by scattering heat carrying phonons with nanoscale artifacts. We have observed that doping thermoelectric material with carbon quantum dots (size < 5 nm) tremendously increased electrical conductivity and thermoelectric power. In the control experiments using carbon powder (same chemical arrangement but larger scale, <100 nm), we did not observe any increase in thermal power density evidencing the nanomanipulation of material properties using carbon quantum dots. Doping thermoelectric materials with carbon quantum dots has high potential due to the quantum enhancement effects on electrical properties of and needs to be further investigated for the design of novel nanocomposite materials with superior thermoelectrical properties.
AB - Thermoelectric (TE) energy harvesters are multi-material solid-state devices that convert heat (i.e. a thermal gradient) directly into electric potential. Currently, the biggest challenge limiting the applications of thermoelectric devices is the low conversion efficiency (<10%). To achieve higher thermoelectric efficiency, electrical conductivity and Seebeck coefficient of thermoelectric materials must be maximized allowing the flow of charge carriers and thermal conductivity must be minimized keeping high temperature gradient between hot and cold sides. These properties are strongly coupled to each other. In other words, improving one property deteriorates the other. In nanoscale however, manipulation of matter at the atomic level can decouple these properties. Nanoengineering is therefore considered to be the only remedy for the low conversion efficiency of thermoelectric materials. Current nanomanipulation techniques focus only on reducing thermal conductivity by scattering heat carrying phonons with nanoscale artifacts. We have observed that doping thermoelectric material with carbon quantum dots (size < 5 nm) tremendously increased electrical conductivity and thermoelectric power. In the control experiments using carbon powder (same chemical arrangement but larger scale, <100 nm), we did not observe any increase in thermal power density evidencing the nanomanipulation of material properties using carbon quantum dots. Doping thermoelectric materials with carbon quantum dots has high potential due to the quantum enhancement effects on electrical properties of and needs to be further investigated for the design of novel nanocomposite materials with superior thermoelectrical properties.
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U2 - 10.1115/IMECE2018-88280
DO - 10.1115/IMECE2018-88280
M3 - Conference contribution
AN - SCOPUS:85063131472
T3 - ASME International Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition, Proceedings (IMECE)
BT - Energy
PB - American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME)
T2 - ASME 2018 International Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition, IMECE 2018
Y2 - 9 November 2018 through 15 November 2018
ER -