Enhanced thermoelectric performance of rough silicon nanowires

Allon I. Hochbaum, Renkun Chen, Raul Diaz Delgado, Wenjie Liang, Erik C. Garnett, Mark Najarian, Arun Majumdar () and Peidong Yang ()
Additional contact information
Allon I. Hochbaum: Department of Chemistry,
Renkun Chen: Department of Mechanical Engineering,
Raul Diaz Delgado: Department of Chemistry,
Wenjie Liang: Department of Chemistry,
Erik C. Garnett: Department of Chemistry,
Mark Najarian: University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA
Arun Majumdar: Department of Mechanical Engineering,
Peidong Yang: Department of Chemistry,

Nature, 2008, vol. 451, issue 7175, 163-167

Abstract: Silicon goes thermoelectric Thermoelectric materials, capable of converting a thermal gradient to an electric field and vice versa, could be useful in power generation and refrigeration. But the fabrication of the available high-performance thermoelectric materials is not easily scaled up to the volumes needed for large-scale heat energy scavenging applications. Nanostructuring improves thermoelectric capabilities of some materials, but good thermoelectric materials tend not to take readily to nanostructuring. How about silicon? It can be processed on a large scale but has poor thermoelectric properties. Two groups now show that silicon's thermoelectric properties can be vastly improved by structuring it into arrays of nanowires and carefully controlling nanowire morphology and doping. So with more development, silicon may have potential as a thermoelectric material.

Date: 2008
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DOI: 10.1038/nature06381

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