Vacancy-induced dislocations within grains for high-performance PbSe thermoelectrics

Zhiwei Chen, Binghui Ge, Wen Li, Siqi Lin, Jiawen Shen, Yunjie Chang, Riley Hanus, G. Jeffrey Snyder () and Yanzhong Pei ()
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Zhiwei Chen: Key Laboratory of Advanced Civil Engineering Materials of Ministry of Education, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Tongji University
Binghui Ge: Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter Physics, Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Science
Wen Li: Key Laboratory of Advanced Civil Engineering Materials of Ministry of Education, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Tongji University
Siqi Lin: Key Laboratory of Advanced Civil Engineering Materials of Ministry of Education, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Tongji University
Jiawen Shen: Key Laboratory of Advanced Civil Engineering Materials of Ministry of Education, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Tongji University
Yunjie Chang: Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter Physics, Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Science
Riley Hanus: Northwestern University
G. Jeffrey Snyder: Northwestern University
Yanzhong Pei: Key Laboratory of Advanced Civil Engineering Materials of Ministry of Education, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Tongji University

Nature Communications, 2017, vol. 8, issue 1, 1-8

Abstract: Abstract To minimize the lattice thermal conductivity in thermoelectrics, strategies typically focus on the scattering of low-frequency phonons by interfaces and high-frequency phonons by point defects. In addition, scattering of mid-frequency phonons by dense dislocations, localized at the grain boundaries, has been shown to reduce the lattice thermal conductivity and improve the thermoelectric performance. Here we propose a vacancy engineering strategy to create dense dislocations in the grains. In Pb1−xSb2x/3Se solid solutions, cation vacancies are intentionally introduced, where after thermal annealing the vacancies can annihilate through a number of mechanisms creating the desired dislocations homogeneously distributed within the grains. This leads to a lattice thermal conductivity as low as 0.4 Wm−1 K−1 and a high thermoelectric figure of merit, which can be explained by a dislocation scattering model. The vacancy engineering strategy used here should be equally applicable for solid solution thermoelectrics and provides a strategy for improving zT.

Date: 2017
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DOI: 10.1038/ncomms13828

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