Enhancement of Thermoelectric Figure-of-Merit in P-type BiSbTe Nanocomposite Alloy

Abstract

ABSTRACT
We have synthesized nanoparticles of P-type bismuth antimony telluride (Bi40-XSbXTe60), where x = 25-30, by wet chemical method which exhibits significant enhancement in the figure of merit ZT upto 1.51. Thermoelectric materials BiSbTe nanocomposite have better compressive strength compared to conventional bulk BiSbTe and hence we are able to enhance ZT by increasing power factor. The enhancement of ZT is due to very low thermal conductivity. ZT approaches maximum with nano to bulk ratio (90:10) which indicates in reverse nanocomposite small amount of bulk is sufficient to raise the power factor.