2026/01/31 by Nan Luo, Z. B. Wang, Ajay Kumar Verma +12 · 1 voice
Engineering · Materials Science · #2D Materials and Applications #Advanced Sensor and Energy Harvesting Materials #Advanced Thermoelectric Materials and Devices
paper · pdf · doi:10.1038/s41467-026-68852-z
openalex publication_date 2026/01/31 · openalex created_date 2026/02/02 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/29
Abstract Printing facilitates low-cost thermoelectric generators to power battery-free internet-of-things devices, wearables, and Industry 4.0 systems. However, scaling up requires printable thermoelectric materials with good mechanical properties and high performance. Here, we report a high-performance Ag 2 (Se 1- x S x ) 1.05 -based n-type printed thermoelectric film through a combination of engineering non-stoichiometric defects and sulfur substitution. An optimal sulfur substitution of 2 at. % facilitates an excellent flexibility and a power factor of~16 µWcm −1 K −2 at 360 K, a 65 % increase compared to a pristine Ag 2 Se film. A fully printed origami-thermoelectric generator produces a maximum power output Pmax <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:msub> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>P</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>max</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> </mml:msub> </mml:math> of 907 µW at a temperature difference of 80 K. A record-high power density p d of 21 W m −2 (corresponding to 800 µW g −1 as a weight-normalized power density) is achieved, twice that of previously reported origami-thermoelectric generators. These results highlight cost-effective manufacturing of thermoelectric generators with the capability to power next-generation autonomous electronic devices.