Tuesday, 31 May 2016: 14:00
Aqua 309 (Hilton San Diego Bayfront)
The rapid development of nanomaterials in the past decade has provided a possibility of directly converting waste heat back to electricity based on the thermoelectric Seebeck effect. In the past four years, we have developed a transformative approach to pioneered low cost and scalable solution-phase growth methods to mass produce thermoelectric nanowires and nanowire heterostructures to match the physical and economic magnitudes of energy use and economical entertainment in the manufacture/recycling. We have studied how spark plasma sintering can help to improve the density, mechanical strength, and electrical conductivity of these nanowires and nanowire heterostructures while minimizing the phase impurity and grain growth. These nanostructured thermoelectric materials show a significantly enhanced performance compared to the bulk crystals based on the quantum confinement and energy filtering.