High Thermoelectric Performance of p-Type Bi0.4Sb1.6Te3+X Synthesized by Plasma-Assisted Ball Milling

The exploration of new synthesis methods is important for the improvement of the thermoelectric property of a material for the different mechanisms of microstructure fabrication, surface activity modulation, and particle refinement. Herein, we prepared p-Bi2Te3 bulk materials by a simple synthesis method of the plasma-assisted ball milling, which yielded finer nanopowders, higher texture of in-plane direction, and higher efficiency compared to the traditional ball milling, favoring the simultaneous improvement of electrical and thermal properties. When combined with the Te liquid sintering, nano-/microscale hierarchical pores were fabricated and the carrier mobility was also increased, which together resulted in the low lattice thermal conductivity of 0.52 W center dot m-1 center dot K-1 and the high power factor of 43.4 mu W center dot cm-1 center dot K-2 at 300 K, as well as the ranking ahead zT of 1.4@375 K. Thus, this work demonstrated the advantages of plasma-assisted ball milling in highly efficient synthesis of p-type Bi2Te3 with promising thermoelectric performance, which can also be utilized to prepare other thermoelectric materials.

Automated summary

The study demonstrates the highly efficient synthesis of p-type Bi2Te3 using plasma-assisted ball milling. By obtaining finer nanopowders and higher in-plane texture, combined with Te liquid sintering to fabricate nano-/microscale hierarchical pores, the lattice thermal conductivity is reduced, resulting in high power factor and promising thermoelectric performance.