Manipulation of the crystal structure defects: An alternative route to the reduction in lattice thermal conductivity and improvement in thermoelectric performance of CuGaTe2

作者：Wu, Wenchang; Li, Yapeng; Du, Zhengliang; Meng, Qingsen; Sun, Zheng; Ren, Wei; Cui, Jiaolin^*

来源：Applied Physics Letters, 2013, 103(1): 011905.

DOI：10.1063/1.4813088

• CHALCOPYRITE SEMICONDUCTORS
• ORDERED ARRAYS
• SUBLATTICE DISTORTION
• INTERVALENCE-BAND
• SILICON NANOWIRES
• CU-TERNARIES
• CUINSE2
• PAIRS

Here, we present the manipulation of the crystal structure defects: an alternative route to reduce the lattice thermal conductivity (kappa(L)) on an atomic scale and improve the thermoelectric performance of CuGaTe2. This semiconductor with defects, represented by anion position displacement (u) and tetragonal deformation (eta), generally gives low kappa(L) values when u and eta distinctly deviate from 0.25 and 1 in the ideal zinc-blende structure, respectively. However, this semiconductor will show high Seebeck coefficients and low electrical conductivities when u and eta are close to 0.25 and 1, respectively, due to the electrical inactivity caused by an attractive interaction between donor-acceptor defect pairs (Ga-Cu(2+)+2V(Cu)(-)).

• 出版日期2013-7-1
• 单位太原理工大学; 宁波工程学院