Electronic structure and thermoelectric properties of Ca3Co4O9

Abstract

The relation among electronic structure., chemical bond and thermoelectric property of Ca3 C04 O9 was studied using density function and discrete variation method (DFTDVM). The gap between the highest valence band (HVB) and the lowest conduction band (LCB) shows a semiconducting property. Ca3 Co4 O9 consists of CoO2 and Ca2 CoO3 two layers. The HVB and LCB near Fermi level are only mainly from O(2) 2p and Co (2) 3d in Ca2CoO3 layer. Therefore, the semiconducting or thermoelectric property of Ca3 Co4 O9 should be mainly from Ca2 CoO3 layer, but it seems to have no direct relation to the CoO2 layer, which is consistent with that binary oxides hardly have a thermoelectric property, but trinary oxide compounds have quite a good thermoelectric property. The covalent and ionic bonds of Ca2 CoO3 layer are both weaker than those of Co02 layer. Ca plays the role of connections between CoO2 and Ca2 CoO3 layers in Ca3 CO4 O9, decrease the ionic and covalent bond strength, and improve the thermoelectric property.