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Hole-doped layered BiCuSeO phases include substitutionally doped Bi1–x A x CuSeO (A = alkali, alkaline earth) as well as vacancy-doped Bi1−δCu1‑γSeO and Bi1−δCuSeO. To probe how their Seebeck coefficients are related to their hole density p, we calculated the Seebeck coefficient for defect-free BiCuSeO as a function of the hole density, which is generated by lowering the Fermi level from the valence band maximum (VBM). In addition, we calculated the Seebeck coefficient for Bi1−δCuSeO (δ = 1/32, 1/16) with a large number of Bi vacancies. The Seebeck coefficients of the hole-doped BiCuSeO phases are governed by the electronic states lying within ∼0.5 eV from the VBM. These states are composed of largely Cu 3d xz/yz and Se 4p x/y states and possess the character of a uniform one-dimensional (1D) chain rather than a uniform two-dimensional (2D) lattice expected for a layered phase. The observed S-vs-p relationship for Bi1–x A x CuSeO (A = alkali, alkaline earth) as well as Bi1−δCu1‑γSeO (δ = 0, 0.025; γ = 0, 0.025) and Bi1−δCuSeO (δ = 0.0, 0.025) is very well reproduced by the calculated relationship for defect-free BiCuSeO within the rigid band approximation. The observed S-vs-p relationship reflects the quantum confinement effect of uniform 1D chains, despite that the hole-doped BiCuSeO phases consist of 2D layers, (Cu2Se2)2– and (Bi2O2)2+. The drastic decrease in the S values of Bi1−δCuSeO with large δ (= 0.05, 0.075, 0.10) arises from the loss of the quantum confinement effect in the (Cu2Se2)2– layers; that is, the uniform 1D chain character is lost because of their geometry distortion induced by a large number of Bi vacancies.

In this article we report point defect-assisted doping mechanism and related thermoelectric transport properties in Pb-doped BiCuOTe compounds.