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The influence of non-idealities on the thermoelectric power factor of nanostructured superlattices

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Thesberg, Mischa, Pourfath, Mahdi, Kosina, Hans and Neophytou, Neophytos (2015) The influence of non-idealities on the thermoelectric power factor of nanostructured superlattices. Journal of Applied Physics, 118 (22). 224301. doi:10.1063/1.4936839 ISSN 0021-8979.

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Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4936839

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Abstract

Cross-plane superlattices composed of nanoscale layers of alternating potential wells and barriers have attracted great attention for their potential to provide thermoelectric power factor improvements and higher ZT figure of merit. Previous theoretical works have shown that the presence of optimized potential barriers could provide improvements to the Seebeck coefficient through carrier energy filtering, which improves the power factor by up to 40%. However, experimental corroboration of this prediction has been extremely scant. In this work, we employ quantum mechanical electronic transport simulations to outline the detrimental effects of random variation, imperfections, and non-optimal barrier shapes in a superlattice geometry on these predicted power factor improvements. Thus, we aim to assess either the robustness or the fragility of these theoretical gains in the face of the types of variation one would find in real material systems. We show that these power factor improvements are relatively robust against: overly thick barriers, diffusion of barriers into the body of the wells, and random fluctuations in barrier spacing and width. However, notably, we discover that extremely thin barriers and random fluctuation in barrier heights by as little as 10% is sufficient to entirely destroy any power factor benefits of the optimized geometry. Our results could provide performance optimization routes for nanostructured thermoelectrics and elucidate the reasons why significant power factor improvements are not commonly realized in superlattices, despite theoretical predictions.

Item Type: Journal Article
Subjects: Q Science > QC Physics
T Technology > TK Electrical engineering. Electronics Nuclear engineering
Divisions: Faculty of Science, Engineering and Medicine > Engineering > Engineering
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): Thermoelectricity , Thermoelectric materials, Superlattices as materials, Nanoscience , Nanotechnology
Journal or Publication Title: Journal of Applied Physics
Publisher: American Institute of Physics
ISSN: 0021-8979
Official Date: 8 December 2015
Dates:
DateEvent
8 December 2015Published
18 November 2015Accepted
14 September 2015Submitted
Volume: 118
Number: 22
Article Number: 224301
DOI: 10.1063/1.4936839
Status: Peer Reviewed
Publication Status: Published
Access rights to Published version: Restricted or Subscription Access
Date of first compliant deposit: 3 March 2016
Date of first compliant Open Access: 3 March 2016
Funder: Fonds zur Förderung der Wissenschaftlichen Forschung (Austria) (FWF)
Grant number: P25368-N30

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