CaltechAUTHORS
Published February 20, 2007 | Version public
Journal Article Metadata-only

Self-Assembled Nanometer Lamellae of Thermoelectric PbTe and Sb_2Te_3 with Epitaxy-like Interfaces

Creators

  • 1. ROR icon California Institute of Technology
  • 2. ROR icon California State Polytechnic University

Abstract

Utilizing the decomposition of metastable Pb_2Sb_6Te_(11) into PbTe and Sb_2Te_3, we produced a layered (lamellar) microstructure of PbTe and Sb_2Te_3 in which the interlamellar spacing can be controlled by the temperature and time of the decomposition process. Adjacent PbTe and Sb_2Te_3 lamellae are crystallographically oriented, indicating high-quality epitaxy-like interfaces. Average lamellar spacings as small as 180 nm are observed, corresponding to a PbTe layer thickness of 40 nm. These nanoscale multilayers, formed by bulk processing, resemble thin-film superlattice thermoelectric materials, which have shown exceptionally high thermoelectric efficiency.

Additional Information

© 2007 American Chemical Society. Received 7 September 2006. Published online 17 January 2007. Published in print 1 February 2007. We thank the Office of Naval Research (Grant N000140610364), the National Science Foundation through Caltech's Center for the Science and Engineering of Materials (CSEM), and the JPLUS program (LC) for their funding of this work.

Additional details

Identifiers

Eprint ID
74015
Resolver ID
CaltechAUTHORS:20170203-100737040

Funding

Office of Naval Research (ONR)
N000140610364
NSF
Jet Propulsion Laboratory Undergraduate Scholars (JPLUS)

Dates

Created
2017-02-03
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Updated
2021-11-11
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