Research Project

Development of environmentally friendly thermoelectric semiconductor using nanostructure interfaces

Profile

Junichiro Shiomi

Outline

Although thermoelectric conversion is a promising technology for waste heat recovery with the ability to directly convert heat to electricity, the low conversion efficiency needs to be improved for many practical applications. In this project, to improve the conversion efficiency, we aim to control phonon and electron transport by using the interfaces of nanostructured bulk thermoelectric material, which consists of randomly distributed nanoscale crystal structures. For this, we develop an analysis tool that relates atomic scale physics to the overall material performance, and carry out material design based on fundamental principles.