Converting body heat into electricity: A step closer towards high-
performance organic thermoelectrics
Date:
April 4, 2022
Source:
Technische Universita"t Dresden
Summary:
Researchers have introduce a new path towards superior organic
thermoelectric devices: highly efficient modulation doping of highly
ordered organic semiconductors under high doping concentrations.
FULL STORY ========================================================================== Researchers have introduce a new path towards superior organic
thermoelectric devices: highly efficient modulation doping of highly
ordered organic semiconductors under high doping concentrations.
==========================================================================
Can you image charging your mobile phone by simply using your body
heat? It may still sound rather futuristic, but thermoelectrics certainly
can do.
Thermoelectrics is all about transforming heat into useful energy,
mostly using inorganic materials.
Because of their mechanical flexibility, light-weight and low thermal conductivity, organic semiconductors have emerged as a promising material system especially for flexible thermoelectric applications. Efficient
doping for charge-carrier creation is the key in thermoelectric device performance.
Conventional bulk doping typically introduces disorder at high doping concentration limiting the electrical conductivity. "In our study,
we employed the modulation-doping approach to highly ordered organic
thin films, where the dopant impurity is separated from the conduction
channel. With this method, we are able to achieve highly efficient doping
even at high doping densities without influencing the charge transport
in the thin films," explains first author Dr. Shu-Jen Wang from the
Institute of Applied Physics at TU Dresden.
The team around Prof. Karl Leo investigated the charge and thermoelectric transport in modulation-doped large-area rubrene thin-film crystals
with different crystal phases. They were able to show that modulation
doping allows achieving superior doping efficiencies even for high
doping densities, when conventional bulk doping runs into the reserve
regime. Modulation-doped orthorhombic rubrene achieves much improved thermoelectric power factors. "Our results show that modulation doping
together with high-mobility crystalline organic semiconductor films is a
novel strategy for achieving high-performance organic thermoelectrics. The
main advantage of the modulation doping technique is the avoidance of
ionized impurity scattering in the highly ordered undoped narrow bandgap semiconductor allowing both carrier concentration and mobility to be independently maximized," states Shu-Jen Wang and Prof. Karl Leo adds:
"Our work paves new ways to achieve flexible thermoelectric devices which
allow to directly generate electrical power from heat in an elegant way
and efficient way. We believe our work will stimulate further work on
high performance organic thermoelectrics using the modulation doping
approach with high mobility organic semiconductors."
========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by Technische_Universita"t_Dresden. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.
========================================================================== Journal Reference:
1. Shu-Jen Wang, Michel Panhans, Ilia Lashkov, Hans Kleemann, Federico
Caglieris, David Becker-Koch, Jo"rn Vahland, Erjuan Guo, Shiyu
Huang, Yulia Krupskaya, Yana Vaynzof, Bernd Bu"chner, Frank Ortmann,
Karl Leo.
Highly efficient modulation doping: A path toward superior
organic thermoelectric devices. Science Advances, 2022; 8 (13)
DOI: 10.1126/ sciadv.abl9264 ==========================================================================
Link to news story:
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/04/220404093010.htm
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