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Recent advances on thermoelectric materials

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Abstract

By converting waste heat into electricity through the thermoelectric power of solids without producing greenhouse gas emissions, thermoelectric generators could be an important part of the solution to today’s energy challenge. There has been a resurgence in the search for new materials for advanced thermoelectric energy conversion applications. In this paper, we will review recent efforts on improving thermoelectric efficiency. Particularly, several novel proof-of-principle approaches such as phonon disorder in phonon-glass-electron crystals, low dimensionality in nanostructured materials and charge-spin-orbital degeneracy in strongly correlated systems on thermoelectric performance will be discussed.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics, Xiamen University, Xiamen, 361005, China

    Jin-cheng Zheng

  2. Condensed Matter Physics and Materials Science Department, Brookhaven National Laboratory, Upton, NY, 11973, USA

    Jin-cheng Zheng

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  1. Jin-cheng Zheng
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Correspondence to Jin-cheng Zheng.

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Zheng, Jc. Recent advances on thermoelectric materials. Front. Phys. China 3, 269–279 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11467-008-0028-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11467-008-0028-9

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