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The outstanding thermoelectric material, SnSe, is also known for its inferior mechanical properties, which bring great inconvenience for its application in thermoelectric devices. In this work, SnSe bulks were prepared via a sequential procedure of high-pressure synthesis (HPS), ball milling, and spark plasma sintering (SPS). The produced polycrystalline samples with a unique microstructure of tightly-bound quasi-equiaxed grains exhibited excellent mechanical properties. The Vickers hardness (HV), compressive strength (σc), and bending strength (σb) reached 1.1 GPa, 300 MPa, and 90 MPa, respectively, all of which are far superior to those of ordinary polycrystalline SnSe. Furthermore, the microstructures did not deteriorate thermoelectric performance. This work demonstrated an effective procedure to prepare polycrystalline microstructure-engineered SnSe materials, which not only show advantages in device applications but also shed light on property enhancement for other layer-structured thermoelectric materials.


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Greatly enhanced mechanical properties of thermoelectric SnSe through microstructure engineering

Show Author's information Chen ChenaBin-Hao WangaChen Chenb( )Hai-Dong ZhaoaBin ZhangaDan WangaTao ShenaPeng-Hui LiaSong ZhaoaDong-Li YuaYong-Jun TianaBo Xua( )
Center for High Pressure Science (CHiPS), State Key Laboratory of Metastable Materials Science and Technology, Yanshan University, Qinhuangdao 066004, China
School of Physical Sciences, Great Bay University, Dongguan 523000, China

Abstract

The outstanding thermoelectric material, SnSe, is also known for its inferior mechanical properties, which bring great inconvenience for its application in thermoelectric devices. In this work, SnSe bulks were prepared via a sequential procedure of high-pressure synthesis (HPS), ball milling, and spark plasma sintering (SPS). The produced polycrystalline samples with a unique microstructure of tightly-bound quasi-equiaxed grains exhibited excellent mechanical properties. The Vickers hardness (HV), compressive strength (σc), and bending strength (σb) reached 1.1 GPa, 300 MPa, and 90 MPa, respectively, all of which are far superior to those of ordinary polycrystalline SnSe. Furthermore, the microstructures did not deteriorate thermoelectric performance. This work demonstrated an effective procedure to prepare polycrystalline microstructure-engineered SnSe materials, which not only show advantages in device applications but also shed light on property enhancement for other layer-structured thermoelectric materials.

Keywords: mechanical properties, hardness, SnSe, thermoelectric materials

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Publication history

Received: 17 December 2022
Revised: 09 February 2023
Accepted: 02 March 2023
Published: 11 April 2023
Issue date: May 2023

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© The Author(s) 2023.

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Key R&D Program of China (2018YFA0305900), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (52001339, 52090020, and 52288102), and the Natural Science Foundation of Hebei Province of China (E2022203109).

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