Chemically Transformed Ag₂ Te Nanowires on Polyvinylidene Fluoride Membrane For Flexible Thermoelectric Applications

Flexible thermoelectric devices of nanomaterials have shown a great potential for applications in wearable to remotely located electronics with desired shapes and geometries. Continuous powering up the low power flexible electronics is a major challenge. We are reporting a flexible thermoelectric module prepared from silver telluride (Ag₂ Te) nanowires (NWs), which are chemically transformed from uniquely synthesized and scalable tellurium (Te) NWs. Conducting Ag₂ Te NWs composites have shown an ultralow total thermal conductivity ~0.22 W/mK surpassing the bulk melt-grown Ag₂ Te ~1.23 W/mK at ~300 K, which is attributed to the nanostructuring of the material. Flexible thermoelectric device consisting of 4 legs (n-type) of Ag₂ Te NWs on polyvinylidene fluoride membrane displays a significant output voltage (V_oc ) ~2.3 mV upon human touch and V_oc ~18 mV at temperature gradient, ΔT ~50 K, which shows the importance of NWs based flexible thermoelectric devices to power up the low power wearable electronics.