High Thermoelectric Action in Vacuum Deposited Indium Alloyed Chalcogenide Thin Films: In<italic>x</italic>Se100-<italic>x</italic>

Abstract

Chalcogenide glasses own high degree of disorder which is a significant parameter to improve the performance of thermoelectric materials. Here, we study the electrical and thermoelectric properties of vacuum deposited In x Se100- x ( ${x} = \textsf {6}$ , 12, 18, and 24) chalcogenide thin films in the temperature range from 300 to 450 K. The values of dc conductivity have been determined and were found to increase from $\textsf {0.029} \times \textsf {10}^{-\textsf {10}} \Omega ^{-\textsf {1}}\,\cdot \, \text{m}^{-\textsf {1}}$ ( ${x} = \textsf {6}$ ) to $173.546\times 10^{-\textsf {10}} \Omega ^{-\textsf {1}}\,\cdot \, \text{m}^{-\textsf {1}}$ ( ${x} = \textsf {24}$ ). Thin film samples for ${x} = \textsf {6}$ , 12, 18, and 24 have shown high values of the Seebeck coefficient. The obtained results for the dc conductivity and the Seebeck coefficient may lead to a high value of the power factor. Looking into the results, it is expected that ${x}= \textsf {6}$ , 12, 18, and 24 samples have high figure of merit and may be explored as new thermoelectric materials.