Synthesis of n-type Mg2Si/CNT Thermoelectric Nanofibers

Keiko Kikuchi; Kodai Yamamoto; Naoyuki Nomura; Akira Kawasaki

doi:10.1186/s11671-017-2120-y

Synthesis of n-type Mg₂Si/CNT Thermoelectric Nanofibers

Nanoscale Res Lett. 2017 Dec;12(1):343. doi: 10.1186/s11671-017-2120-y. Epub 2017 May 10.

Authors

Keiko Kikuchi^{1

2}, Kodai Yamamoto³, Naoyuki Nomura³, Akira Kawasaki³

Affiliations

¹ Department of Materials Processing, Graduate School of Engineering, Tohoku University, Sendai, 980-8579, Japan. kikuchi@material.tohoku.ac.jp.
² , Postal address: 6-6-02, Aramaki Aza Aoba, Aoba-ku, Sendai, Miyagi, 980-8579, Japan. kikuchi@material.tohoku.ac.jp.
³ Department of Materials Processing, Graduate School of Engineering, Tohoku University, Sendai, 980-8579, Japan.

Abstract

Magnesium silicide (Mg₂Si)/carbon nanotube (CNT) thermoelectric nanofibers for use as a flexible thermoelectric material were successfully synthesized through the combined processes of the sol-gel method, magnesiothermic reduction, and liquid-solid phase reaction. In the resulting product, each CNT was coated with Mg₂Si which was an approximately 60-nm-thick single crystal. The synthesized Mg₂Si-coated CNTs exhibited n-type thermoelectric behavior confirming that n-type thermoelectric composite nanofibers were successfully obtained.

Keywords: Carbon nanotubes; Flexible thermoelectric material; Magnesium silicide; Thermoelectric nanofibers.