0000000000023010
AUTHOR
Jennifer Schmitt
Engineering half-Heusler thermoelectric materials using Zintl chemistry
In this Review, the structure, bonding and defects of half-Heusler compounds are explained in terms of the framework of Zintl (or valence-precise) chemistry. This deeper understanding of the structure and electronic properties of half-Heusler compounds should aid the design of improved thermoelectric materials.
Optimization of the carrier concentration in phase-separated half-Heusler compounds
Inspired by the promising thermoelectric properties of phase-separated half-Heusler materials, we investigated the influence of electron doping in the n-type Ti_(0.3−x)Zr_(0.35)Hf_(0.35)NiSn compound. The addition of Nb to this compound led to a significant increase in its electrical conductivity, and shifted the maximum Seebeck coefficient to higher temperatures owing to the suppression of intrinsic carriers. This resulted in an enhancement of both the power factor α^2σ and figure of merit, zT. The applicability of an average effective mass model revealed the optimized electron properties for samples containing Nb. There is evidence in the literature that the average effective mass model i…
Pressure-restored superconductivity in Cu-substituted FeSe
Copper doping of FeSe destroys its superconductivity at ambient pressure, even at low doping levels. Here we report the pressure-dependent transport and structural properties of Fe${}_{1.01\ensuremath{-}x}$Cu${}_{x}$Se with 3$%$ and 4$%$ Cu doping and find that the superconductivity is restored. Metallic resistivity behavior, absent in Cu-doped FeSe, is also restored. At the low pressure of 1.5 GPa, superconductivity is seen at 6 K for 4$%$ Cu doping, somewhat lower than the 8 K ${T}_{c}$ of undoped FeSe. ${T}_{c}$ reaches its maximum of 31.3 K at 7.8 GPa, lower than the maximum superconducting temperature in the undoped material under pressure (${T}_{c}$ max of 37 K) but still very high. X…
Effect of pressure on superconductivity in NaAlSi
The ternary superconductor NaAlSi, isostructural with LiFeAs, the ``111'' iron pnictide superconductor, is investigated under pressure. The structure remains stable up to 15 GPa. Resistivity and susceptibility measurements show an increase of ${T}_{c}$ up to 2 GPa, followed by a decrease until superconductivity disappears at 4.8 GPa. Band structure calculations show that pressure should have a negligible effect on the electronic structure and the Fermi surface and thus the disappearance of superconductivity under pressure must have a different origin. We compare the electronic structure of NaAlSi under pressure with that of nonsuperconducting isostructural NaAlGe.
Resolving the true band gap of ZrNiSn half-Heusler thermoelectric materials
N-type XNiSn (X = Ti, Zr, Hf) half-Heusler (HH) compounds possess excellent thermoelectric properties, which are believed to be attributed to their relatively high mobility. However, p-type XNiSn HH compounds have poor figures of merit, zT, compared to XCoSb compounds. This can be traced to the suppression of the magnitude of the thermopower at high temperatures. E_g = 2eS_(max)T_(max) relates the band gap to the thermopower peak. However, from this formula, one would conclude that the band gap of p-type XNiSn solid solutions is only one-third that of n-type XNiSn, which effectively prevents p-type XNiSn HHs from being useful thermoelectric materials. The study of p-type HH Zr_(1−x)Sc_xNiSn…
CSD 1784742: Experimental Crystal Structure Determination
Related Article: Leslie Schoop, Lukas Müchler, Jennifer Schmitt, Vadim Ksenofontov, Sergey Medvedev, Jürgen Nuss, Frederick Casper, Martin Jansen, R. J. Cava, Claudia Felser|2012|Phys.Rev.B|86|174522|doi:10.1103/PhysRevB.86.174522