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Realization of high thermoelectric performance in n-type partially filled skutterudites

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Abstract

Skutterudites are among the most exciting thermoelectric (TE) materials that could be used for various intermediate temperature applications. This study summarized our recent work on n-type partially filled skutterudites. By combining theoretical and experimental approaches, we revealed the underlying mechanism of void filling in the intrinsic lattice voids in CoSb3. With that, the electronegativity selection rule is established for the current stable filled skutterudites and further used for the discovery of a few novel filled CoSb3 compounds. The correlation between the thermal/electrical transport properties and impurity fillers in n-type partially filled skutterudites was also carefully investigated. Our results provide fundamental understanding to how those filler impurities affect electronic structures and lattice dynamics. Based on these basic understanding on transport mechanisms and sophisticated strategy in materials synthesis, TE figure of merit for n-type materials were continually increased from 1.1 to 1.4 and then to 1.7 for single-, double-, and triple-filled skutterudites.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The authors thank Prof. T.M. Tritt and Dr. H. Böttner for inviting us to prepare this review. This work is in part supported by National Basic Research Program of China (973 program) under Project No. 2007CB607500 and by NSFC Grant (50821004 and 50825205).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of High Performance Ceramics and Superfine Microstructure and CAS Key Laboratory of Energy-conversion Materials, Shanghai Institute of Ceramics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, 200050, China

    Xun Shi, Shengqiang Bai, Lili Xi, Jiong Yang, Wenqing Zhang & Lidong Chen

  2. GM R&D Center, Chemical Sciences and Materials Systems Laboratory, Warren, Michigan, 48090, USA

    Jihui Yang

Authors
  1. Xun Shi
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  2. Shengqiang Bai
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  3. Lili Xi
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  4. Jiong Yang
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  5. Wenqing Zhang
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  6. Lidong Chen
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  7. Jihui Yang
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Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Xun Shi or Wenqing Zhang.

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Shi, X., Bai, S., Xi, L. et al. Realization of high thermoelectric performance in n-type partially filled skutterudites. Journal of Materials Research 26, 1745–1754 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1557/jmr.2011.84

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1557/jmr.2011.84

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