Thermoelectric properties of zinc antimonide thin film deposited on flexible polyimide substrate by RF magnetron sputtering

Abstract

Zinc-antimony binary system is one of the most promising P-type thermoelectric materials for low cost intermediate temperature thermoelectric application. In this work, zinc antimonide thin film was deposited on the flexible polyimide substrate using zinc antimonide alloy target. All the samples were annealed in argon atmosphere at different temperatures and the thermoelectric properties of all the samples were significantly boosted. X-ray diffraction results displayed that single ZnSb phase was obtained when the annealing temperature above 300 °C. The thin film annealed at 325 °C possessed the carrier concentration of 3.59 × 10¹⁹ cm⁻³, which was the most optimum carrier concentration. The maximum Seebeck coefficient of 280 μV K⁻¹ and the maximum power factor of 2.35 × 10⁻³ Wm⁻¹ K⁻² was obtained at 260 °C. The Seebeck coefficient and the power factor increase with the increasing of the testing temperature. The thermoelectric properties of thin film annealed at 325 °C were better than other samples.