Study on the thermoelectric properties of porous Bi-Te films deposited using thermal evaporation on AAO template

摘要

The application of thermoelectric films is limited to retain the temperature gradient. In this study, the Bi-Te films are deposited on the AAO template with a pore size of 100 nm using thermal evaporation. The results show that the conductive types of the Bi-Te film are tuned by source temperature. The power factor of the p-type porous film decreases 36% by comparing to that of the p-type nonporous film (1020 mu W/mK(2) at 250 degrees C). Meanwhile, the temperature difference in the porous device is maintained and is approximately 5.0 degrees C. Thus, the maximum output power is achieved in the porous device (about 25 pW), which is 5 times higher than that of the nonporous device. This provides a method to improve the conversion efficiency of thermoelectric film device by maintaining the temperature difference by using porous structure.