Water‐resistant organic thermoelectric generator with >10 μW output

Abstract Flexible p–n thermoelectric generator (TEG) technology has rapidly advanced with power enhancement and size reduction. To achieve a stable supply highly efficient energy conversion, absolute chemical stability of n‐type materials is essential to ensuring large temperature differences between device terminals ambient stability. With the aim improving long‐term operation carbon nanotubes (CNTs) in air water, this study uses cationic surfactants, such as octylene‐1,8‐bis(dimethyldodecylammonium bromide) (12–8–12), gemini surfactant, stabilize coating, which retains n‐doped state for more than 28 days after exposure water experiments. TEGs 10 units 12–8–12/CNT (n‐type) sodium dodecylbenzene sulfonate/CNT (p‐type) layers are manufactured, their evaluated. The initial maximum output 16.1 µW (75 K difference) retained immersion 40 without using sealant prevent TEG module degradation. excellent these CNT‐based makes them suitable underwater applications, battery‐free health monitoring information gathering systems, facilitates development soft electronics.