High-Performance Bismuth Antimony Telluride Thermoelectric Membrane on Curved and Flexible Supports

Liangwei Fu, Kwansu Park, Sang Il Kim, Bongju Kim, Hyun Yong Song, Wooseon Choi, Young Min Kim, Jae Yeol Hwang, Kyu Hyoung Lee, Sung Wng Kim

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

25 Scopus citations

Abstract

Separation of epitaxial thin films on a growth substrate and transfer onto other materials for functional heterostructures have boosted the transformative impact on science and technology. However, this scheme has proved challenging in thin-film thermoelectrics but promises a vast range of applications beyond the limited device configurations of bulk thermoelectrics. Here, the high-quality Bi0.5Sb1.5Te3 (BST) epitaxial thin film on a sapphire substrate grown by spontaneous van der Waals epitaxy (vdWE) is exfoliated and transferred onto versatile materials, creating high-performance thermoelectric membranes. Unprecedented millimeter-size vdWE BST membranes are produced by etching a pseudomorphic Te monolayer on the surface of a sapphire substrate in dilute HF solution. The intact exfoliation and direct transfer for vdWE BST membranes maintain the high-quality crystallinity, resulting in the remarkable zT value (∼0.9 at 300 K). These results represent the realization of long-pursued but undemonstrated high-performance thin-film thermoelectrics, paving the way for the design and fabrication of arbitrarily shaped thermoelectric devices.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)2378-2385
Number of pages8
JournalACS Energy Letters
Volume6
Issue number7
DOIs
StatePublished - 9 Jul 2021

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'High-Performance Bismuth Antimony Telluride Thermoelectric Membrane on Curved and Flexible Supports'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this