Abstract
Magnetic materials in which thermal transport involves the generation of spin fluxes provide new opportunities to improve the thermal-to-electric energy conversion efficiency over that of conventional, electron-based thermoelectrics. This review outlines the basic concept for thermal spin transport by both magnons and spin-polarized electrons. It begins by outlining the fundamentals of thermal spin transport, and highlights that the thermopower of electrons is proportional to the relative energy derivative of their transmission function (the Mott relation), where that of magnons is proportional to the specific heat per magnon. Therefore, magnons can boost the thermopower of metals by an order of magnitude by magnon-drag effects, for which several predictive theories are discussed and justified with experimental results. Magnon-drag works readily above room temperature and suffers little from defect scattering. Furthermore, the Spin-Seebeck effect (SSE), generally studied in multilayer, thin-film samples, is discussed here in the context of energy conversion in new configurations, namely bulk nanocomposite materials. SSE is also an effect that persists to room temperature and above.
Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
