The presented paper gives an overview of basic principles and recent trends in power management electronics for thermoelectric energy harvesting. Energy harvesting systems are a modern way how to feed the autonomous devices on-site using ambient energy. The ambient energy in the case of thermoelectric generators is represented by temperature gradients. Different temperatures are applied to the ...

Thermoelectric materials are used as solid-state heat pumps and as power generators. The low efficiency of devices based on conventional bulk thermoelectric materials confines their applications to niches in which their advantages in compactness and controllability outweigh that drawback. Recent developments in nanotechnologies have led to the development of thermoelectric nano-materials with d...

OBJECTIVES A nondestructive, rapid, and practical method of dental alloy sorting is desirable. In this study, the hypothesis to be tested is that dental alloys show significantly different and high thermoelectric power values, on the basis of which alloy sorting is possible. METHODS Six silver-colored commercial dental casting alloys are used in this study: two silver alloys, one gold-silver-...

Low-dimensional semiconductors are considered promising candidates for thermoelectric applications with enhanced performance because of a drastic reduction in their thermal conductivity, κl, and possibilities of enhanced power factors. This is also the case for traditionally poor thermoelectric materials such as silicon. This work presents atomistic simulations for the electronic, thermal, and ...

In this paper, the performance of a thermoelectric module is analysed using the thermodynamic diagram TemperatureEntropy. This diagram can be used as a graphical tool which allows for the analysis of thermoelectric processes, both reversible and non-reversible, in an elemental pair or thermoelectric elements. A similarity is found between the Seebeck coefficient and entropy per unit of electric...

The growing popularity of solid state thermoelectric devices in cooling applications has sparked an increasing diversity of thermoelectric coolers (TECs) on the market, commonly known as “Peltier modules”. They can also be used as generators, converting a temperature difference into electric power, and opportunities are plentiful to make use of these devices as thermoelectric generators (TEGs) ...

Researchers have long been searching for the materials to enhance thermoelectric performance in terms of nano scale approach in order to realize phonon-glass-electron-crystal and quantum confinement effects. Peierls distortion can be a pathway to enhance thermoelectric figure-of-merit ZT by employing natural nano-wire-like electronic and thermal transport. The phonon-softening known as Kohn ano...

Although many thermoelectric materials, such as Bi2Te3, PbTe and CoSb3, possess excellent thermoelectric properties, they often contain toxic and expensive elements. Moreover, most of them are synthesized by processes such as vacuum melting, mechanical alloying or solid-state reactions, which are highly energy and time intensive. All these factors limit commercial applications of the thermoelec...

In this work, we have studied thermoelectric properties of monolayer and fewlayer MoS2 in both armchair and zigzag orientations. Density functional theory (DFT) using non-equilibrium Green's function (NEGF) method has been implemented to calculate the transmission spectra of mono- and fewlayer MoS2 in armchair and zigzag directions. Phonon transmission spectra are calculated based on parameteri...

Fifty years ago, the optimization of thermoelectric devices was analyzed by considering the relation between optimal performances and local entropy production. Entropy is produced by the irreversible processes in thermoelectric devices. If these processes could be eliminated, entropy production would be reduced to zero, and the limiting Carnot efficiency or coefficient of performance would be o...