Conditions for Thermoelectric Power Factor Improvements upon Band Alignment in Complex Bandstructure Materials.

ABSTRACT: Band alignment (or band convergence) is a strategy suggested to provide improvements in the thermoelectric power factor (PF) of materials with complex bandstructures. The addition of more bands at the energy region that contributes to transport can provide more conducting paths and could improve the electrical conductivity and PF of a material. However, this can lead to increased intervalley scattering, which will tend to degrade the conductivity. Using the Boltzmann transport equation (BTE) and a multiband model, we theoretically investigate the conditions under which band alignment can improve the PF. We show that PF improvements are realized when intraband scattering between the aligned bands dominates over interband scattering, with larger improvements reached when a light band is brou

SUBMITTER: Akhtar SEA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11815832 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature