Enhanced thermoelectric figure of merit in polycrystalline carbon\n nanostructures

2015/06/29 by Thomas Lehmann, Lehmann, Thomas, Dmitry A. Ryndyk +3 · 1 citation
Materials Science · #Thermal properties of materials #Graphene research and applications #Advanced Thermoelectric Materials and Devices

paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.1506.08531

Abstract

Grain boundaries are commonly observed in carbon nanostructures, but their\ninfluence on thermal and electric properties are still not completely\nunderstood. Using a combined approach of density functional tight-binding\ntheory and non-equilibrium Green functions we investigate electron and phonon\ntransport in carbon based systems. In this work, quantum transport and\nthermoelectric properties are summarized for graphene sheets, graphene\nnanoribbons and carbon nanotubes with a variety of grain boundary types in a\nwide temperature range. Motivated by previous findings that disorder scatters\nphonons more effectively than electrons, a significant improvement in the\nthermoelectric performance for polycrystalline systems is expected. As the\neffect is marginally sensitive to the grain boundary type, we demonstrate that\ngrain boundaries are a viable tool to greatly enhance the figure of merit,\npaving the way for the design of new thermoelectric materials.\n

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