Journal
MRS BULLETIN
Volume 43, Issue 3, Pages 181-186Publisher
CAMBRIDGE UNIV PRESS
DOI: 10.1557/mrs.2018.7
Keywords
-
Funding
- Solid-State Solar-Thermal Energy Conversion Center (S3TEC), an Energy Frontier Research Center - US Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Science [DE-SC0001299]
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Manipulating the thermal conductivity of solids is important for practical applications. Due to the fact that phonons in thermoelectric materials have longer mean free paths (MFPs) than electrons, strengthening phonon scattering to reduce lattice thermal conductivity (kappa(lat)) becomes the most straightforward and effective approach to enhance the thermoelectric figure of merit, ZT, which determines the maximum device efficiency. Phonons have a wide range of MFPs in semiconductors, and different dimensions of lattice defects can be targeted to scatter particular phonons with distinct relaxation times. Designing hierarchical nano-microstructures, spanning from point defects to volume defects, would be beneficial to achieve low kappa(lat) via a full spectrum of phonon scattering. Herein, we review the formation and underlying mechanisms for lattice defects and highlight the role of all-scale hierarchical nano-microstructure on phonon engineering. Existing challenges in simulations are also discussed.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available