Boosting thermoelectrics by alloying Cu2Se in SnTe-CdTe compounds

doi:10.1016/j.jmst.2021.02.012

Abstract

Abstract:

The discovery of band convergence has opened an effective avenue for significantly enhancing thermoelectric performance of SnTe, while alloying CdTe in SnTe is evidenced efficient for improving the valley degeneracy. However, the thermoelectric transport properties are limited due to the low solubility of CdTe in SnTe (∼3%). Inspired by the improvement of dimensionless figure of merit zT in Cu or Se-doped SnTe, investigating the effect of Cu₂Se on the electronic and phonon transport properties of SnTe-CdTe alloys is highly desired. Traditionally, improving the quality factor can trigger an increase of the potential of a compound for higher zT, which is of importance for design of thermoelectric materials. Here, alloyed 3% Cu₂Se in SnTe-3%CdTe system enables an increased peak zT, which is attributed by the optimization of electronic performance (~21 μW cm ^-1 K^-2 at 800 K), as well as the decreased lattice thermal conductivity owing to the enhanced mass and strain fluctuations. More importantly, alloying Cu₂Se not only improves the quality factor from ∼0.25 to ∼0.45, resulting in a higher maximum potential zT, but also effectively preserves the Fermi energy in a relative optimized level. The current findings demonstrate the role of Cu₂Se for manipulating thermoelectrics in SnTe.

Key words: SnTe, Thermoelectrics, Quality factor, Fermi level

Zhiyu Chen, Juan Li, Jing Tang, Fujie Zhang, Yan Zhong, Hangtian Liu, Ran Ang. Boosting thermoelectrics by alloying Cu₂Se in SnTe-CdTe compounds[J]. J. Mater. Sci. Technol., 2021, 89: 45-51.

Figures/Tables 7

Fig. 1. Room temperature powder X-ray diffraction (XRD) patterns (a) and the corresponding lattice parameter a (b) for (Sn0.99Cd0.03Te)1-x(Cu2Se)x samples (0≤x≤0.04).

Fig. 2. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) images for samples Sn0.99Cd0.03Te (a) and (Sn0.99Cd0.03Te)0.97(Cu2Se)0.03 (b). The energy-dispersive spectroscopy (EDS) analysis of the matrix (c) and the precipitates (d) for sample (Sn0.99Cd0.03Te)0.97(Cu2Se)0.03.

Fig. 3. Temperature dependent Hall coefficient RH (a) and Hall mobility μH (b) for (Sn0.99Cd0.03Te)1-x(Cu2Se)x (0.01≤x≤0.04).

Fig. 4. Carrier concentration dependent Seebeck coefficient S (a) and Hall mobility μH (b) at room temperature for (Sn0.99Cd0.03Te)1-x(Cu2Se)x (0.01 ≤ x ≤ 0.04) alloys, with a comparison to theoretical predictions (gray curves) and literature results for SnTe-Cu2Te,SnTe-CdTe and SnTe-CdSe [36,45,48,56].

Fig. 5. Temperature dependent resistivity ρ (a), Seebeck coefficient S (b), power factor PF (c), and weighted mobility μw (d) for (Sn0.99Cd0.03Te)1-x(Cu2Se)x (x = 0～0.04). The inset in (d) shows the alloying content dependent μw at 800 K.

Fig. 6. Temperature dependent total thermal conductivity κ and lattice thermal conductivity κL (a). Composition dependent longitudinal (vl), transverse (vt), average (vs) sound velocities, and Grüneisen parameters γ at 300 K for (Sn0.99Cd0.03Te)1-x(Cu2Se)x (0≤x≤0.04) (b). The Cu2Se alloying content dependent lattice thermal conductivity κL for (Sn0.99Cd0.03Te)1-x(Cu2Se)x alloys at room temperature, with a comparison to Debye-Callaway prediction. The blue and gray solid prediction curve considerate x and 2x Cu-substitutional defects, respectively (c).

Fig. 7. Temperature dependent figure of merit zT for (Sn0.99Cd0.03Te)1-x(Cu2Se)x, with a comparison to pristine SnTe [43] (a). zT at 800 K for x = 0 and 0.03, with a comparison to literature results of other SnTe-based alloys [43,45,48] (b). Reduced Fermi level dependent zT with different quality factor B (c) for materials in this work, with a comparison to pristine SnTe, SnTe-CdSe, SnTe-CdTe, and SnTe-CdTe-Cu2Te system results [36,43,44,48].

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Boosting thermoelectrics by alloying Cu₂Se in SnTe-CdTe compounds

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