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ZT Optimization: An Application Focus

Significant research has been performed on the challenge of improving thermoelectric materials, with maximum peak figure of merit, ZT, the most common target. We use an approximate thermoelectric material model, matched to real materials, to demonstrate that when an application is known, average ZT...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Tuley, Richard, Simpson, Kevin
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2017
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5503391/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28772668
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ma10030309
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author Tuley, Richard
Simpson, Kevin
author_facet Tuley, Richard
Simpson, Kevin
author_sort Tuley, Richard
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description Significant research has been performed on the challenge of improving thermoelectric materials, with maximum peak figure of merit, ZT, the most common target. We use an approximate thermoelectric material model, matched to real materials, to demonstrate that when an application is known, average ZT is a significantly better optimization target. We quantify this difference with some examples, with one scenario showing that changing the doping to increase peak ZT by 19% can lead to a performance drop of 16%. The importance of average ZT means that the temperature at which the ZT peak occurs should be given similar weight to the value of the peak. An ideal material for an application operates across the maximum peak ZT, otherwise maximum performance occurs when the peak value is reduced in order to improve the peak position.
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spelling pubmed-55033912017-07-28 ZT Optimization: An Application Focus Tuley, Richard Simpson, Kevin Materials (Basel) Article Significant research has been performed on the challenge of improving thermoelectric materials, with maximum peak figure of merit, ZT, the most common target. We use an approximate thermoelectric material model, matched to real materials, to demonstrate that when an application is known, average ZT is a significantly better optimization target. We quantify this difference with some examples, with one scenario showing that changing the doping to increase peak ZT by 19% can lead to a performance drop of 16%. The importance of average ZT means that the temperature at which the ZT peak occurs should be given similar weight to the value of the peak. An ideal material for an application operates across the maximum peak ZT, otherwise maximum performance occurs when the peak value is reduced in order to improve the peak position. MDPI 2017-03-17 /pmc/articles/PMC5503391/ /pubmed/28772668 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ma10030309 Text en © 2017 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Tuley, Richard
Simpson, Kevin
ZT Optimization: An Application Focus
title ZT Optimization: An Application Focus
title_full ZT Optimization: An Application Focus
title_fullStr ZT Optimization: An Application Focus
title_full_unstemmed ZT Optimization: An Application Focus
title_short ZT Optimization: An Application Focus
title_sort zt optimization: an application focus
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5503391/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28772668
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ma10030309
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