Development and Application of a Research Technique to Study Thermal and Electrophysical Parameters of Thermoelectric Materials at Temperatures up to 1200 K

Abstract

Methods to study the dependencies of electrical conductivity, Seebeck coefficient, and thermal conductivity have been developed. To implement the methods, a hardware-software measuring complex which allows conducting investigations in the temperature range 300 - 1200 K has been developed and manufactured. Methods were proposed and the relative errors for the measurements of the mentioned parameters were calculated. The following measurement errors were established: electrical conductivity and Seebeck coefficient - 3%; thermal conductivity - 5%.Investigation of the temperature dependences of the electrical conductivity, Seebeck coefficient and thermal conductivity for the effective thermoelectric materials developed was performed. The materials under study were based on Bi2Te3; Sb2Te3; PbTe; Gete; SiGe, and were used for the manufacturing of the multisectional generator thermoelements with operating temperatures up to 1200 K. The mechanisms of heat and electric transfer in the materials under consideration were determined. The paper proposes a methodology of research and provides calculations for heat conductivity components.