QUT team make stretchable semiconductors better able to turn body heat into electricity

A team of Queensland University of Technology researchers (pictured) have developed a new alloy with potential use in wearable, flexible semiconductors.

The researchers, each from QUT and each belonging to the ARC Research Hub in Zero-emission Power Generation for Carbon Neutrality (ZeroPC), published their work in the journal Nature Communications.

A statement from the university describes their research as involving precisely-controlled  “vacancy engineering” to improve an AgCu(Te, Se, S) semiconductor’s ability to convert body heat into electricity. 

The paper “details the process… guided by advanced computational design” where a flexible semiconductor was designed and then created “through a simple and cost-effective melting method.” (More detail is available in the article, linked here.)

First author Nanhai Li said thermoelectric materials had gained growing attention due to their ability to convert heat into pollution-free electricity, with the study geared towards doing a material that could do this more efficiently while also being flexible and stretchable.

“As a continuous heat source, the human body produces a certain temperature difference with the surroundings, and when we exercise, that generates more heat and a larger temperature difference between the human body and the environment,” Li explained in a statement on Wednesday.

Professor Zhi-Gang Chen, founding director of the ZeroPC hub, said that “Mainstream flexible thermoelectric devices” were currently made of inorganic thin-film thermoelectric materials, organic thermoelectric materials deposited on flexible substrates, and hybrid composites of both.

“Both organic and inorganic materials have their limitations – organic materials typically suffer from low performance and while inorganic materials offer better conductivity of heat and electricity, typically they are brittle and not flexible,” said Chen.

“The type of semiconductor used in this research is a rare inorganic material that has striking potential for flexible thermoelectric performance. However, the underlying physics and chemistry mechanisms for enhancing its performance while maintaining exceptional plasticity remained largely unexplored until now.”

Picture: credit QUT

Further reading

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