Tellurization: An Alternative Strategy to Construct Thermoelectric Bi2Te3 Films

• Published in: Journal of physical chemistry. C Vol. 115; no. 32; pp. 16167 - 16171
• Main Authors: Sun, Zhengliang, Liufu, Shengcong, Chen, Xihong, Chen, Lidong
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: American Chemical Society 18.08.2011
• Subjects: C: Electron Transport, Optical and Electronic Devices, Hard Matter
• ISSN: 1932-7447; 1932-7455
• DOI: 10.1021/jp203390y

An alternative tellurization strategy has been introduced into the construction of thermoelectric Bi2Te3 films by a facile chemical vapor transport process, in which presynthesized bismuth films made by a solution route were used as the platform. The synthesized Bi2Te3 films are highly crystallized with (00l) orientation, which is attributed to embedded (00l) oriented nanoplates. On the basis of the experiment phenomena, a possible mechanism was proposed for the nucleation and growth of bismuth telluride. The thickness of the embedded nanoplates can be easily adjusted by changing the reaction temperature in the chemical vapor transport process. N-type conduction behavior as well as the adjustable transport properties for the Bi2Te3 films were discussed in detail. The optimized power factor reaches 20.4 μW cm–1 K–1 at room temperature, which is 1 order higher than the value of the solution-based films, and even comparable to the value of the vacuum-based Bi2Te3 films.