title: Ultrahigh power factor and thermoelectric performance in hole-doped single-crystal SnSe.
abstract: Thermoelectric technology, harvesting electric power directly from heat, is a promising environmentally friendly means of energy savings and power generation. The thermoelectric efficiency is determined by the device dimensionless figure of merit ZT(dev), and optimizing this efficiency requires maximizing ZT values over a broad temperature range. Here, we report a record high ZT(dev) ∼1.34, with ZT ranging from 0.7 to 2.0 at 300 to 773 kelvin, realized in hole-doped tin selenide (SnSe) crystals. The exceptional performance arises from the ultrahigh power factor, which comes from a high electrical conductivity and a strongly enhanced Seebeck coefficient enabled by the contribution of multiple electronic valence bands present in SnSe. SnSe is a robust thermoelectric candidate for energy conversion applications in the low and moderate temperature range.
authors.affiliation: School of Materials Science and Engineering, Beihang University, Beijing 100191, China. Department of Chemistry, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL 60208, USA. zhaolidong@buaa.edu.cn m-kanatzidis@northwestern.edu.
authors.forename: Li-Dong
authors.initials: LD
authors.lastname: Zhao
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL 60208, USA.
authors.forename: Gangjian
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Tan
authors.affiliation: Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL 60208, USA.
authors.forename: Shiqiang
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Hao
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, South University of Science and Technology of China, Shenzhen 518055, China.
authors.forename: Jiaqing
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: He
authors.affiliation: School of Materials Science and Engineering, Beihang University, Beijing 100191, China.
authors.forename: Yanling
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Pei
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA.
authors.forename: Hang
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Chi
authors.affiliation: Materials Science, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA.
authors.forename: Heng
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: School of Materials Science and Engineering, Beihang University, Beijing 100191, China.
authors.forename: Shengkai
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Gong
authors.affiliation: School of Materials Science and Engineering, Beihang University, Beijing 100191, China.
authors.forename: Huibin
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Xu
authors.affiliation: Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL 60208, USA.
authors.forename: Vinayak P
authors.initials: VP
authors.lastname: Dravid
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA.
authors.forename: Ctirad
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Uher
authors.affiliation: Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL 60208, USA.
authors.forename: G Jeffrey
authors.initials: GJ
authors.lastname: Snyder
authors.affiliation: Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL 60208, USA.
authors.forename: Chris
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Wolverton
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL 60208, USA. zhaolidong@buaa.edu.cn m-kanatzidis@northwestern.edu.
authors.forename: Mercouri G
authors.initials: MG
authors.lastname: Kanatzidis