Structural and mechanical properties of spark plasma sintered n- and p-type bismuth telluride alloys

Spark Plasma Sintering (SPS) is used for the fabrication of wafers of n- and p-type thermoelectric V2VI3 materials. The SPS process did not change the overall chemical composition. X-ray diffraction analysis and the electron backscattered selected area diffraction prove the preferential orientation after the SPS procedure expecting anisotropic thermoelectric properties. The mechanical properties of the SPS material are enormously enhanced, so that the fabrication of thin wafers with only 100 gm thickness suitable for the development of Peltier devices with high cooling power density will be possible. (C) 2007 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.