Effect of Surface Treatment of n-type Bi₂Te₃-based Materials on the Properties of Thermoelectric Units

Abstract

The smaller the size of the Bi 2 Te 3 -based micro thermoelectric device, the more significant the effect of interface bonding strength and contact resistance on the mechanical properties, open circuit voltage and output power of the device. It is of great significance to develop a thermoelectric unit preparation technology with low cost and simple process, and to enable the interface between n-type Bi 2 Te 3 bulk materials and barrier layer with low contact resistance and high bonding strength. Here, surface of n-type Bi 2 Te 3 -based thermoelectric material was treated in mixed acid solution (pH~3), followed by electroless plating Ni (5 m), and then welded with Cu electrode to prepare thermoelectric unit. After corrosion, the anchoring effect between large gully on the surface of n-type Bi 2 Te 3 -based thermoelectric materials and Ni barrier layer contributes to the interface bonding strength of 15.88 MPa for the

Localized Surface Doping Induced Ultralow Contact Resistance between Metal and (Bi,Sb)2Te3 Thermoelectric Films

“…To date, various technologies for lowing or controlling the contact resistivity of (Bi,Sb) 2 Te 3 and the electrode have been investigated, including surface modification − (orange region), interfacial layer design, ,,, (blue region), and structural modulation ,, (red region) as shown in Figure f. In this work, for both p- and n-type interfaces, ultralow contact resistance is achieved with the localized surface doping strategy, which is basically the best-in-class.…”