Review on recent development on thermoelectric functions of PEDOT:PSS based systems

Organic thermoelectric (TE) materials have captured much curiosity, since the discovery of their ability to convert a small quantity of heat energy into electrical one. Moreover, intrinsic conductive polymers and their composites are widely applied in this regards thanks to their unique merits such as flexibility, low or no toxicity, abundance as well as their brilliant TE functions. Thus, one of the most fruitful intrinsic conductive polymeric TE materials is the PEDOT:PSS thanks to its resilience, high intrinsic electrical conductivity, low thermal conductivity and its high figure of merit (zT ~ 0.42). Therefore, in the near future, it is greatly predicted to attain greater performance for being used in real applications thanks to its high thermoelectric potential. So, it’s exciting to introduce the updating advances in TE functions of the conducting polymeric materials based on PEDOT:PSS to be discussed with focusing on its composites, e.g. PEDOT:PSS/alloy, PEDOT:PSS/tellurium, PEDOT:PSS/nano-carbon structure, and PEDOT:PSS/ternary and other composite systems. The impact of nano-materials based on different (nano-sheets, nano-particles, nano-rods, and others) structures on the TE functions of PEDOT:PSS has been matched and argued. Clearly, the role of inorganics (Te, Bi2Te3, BiSbTe, SnSe, CDots and others) fillers in improving the TE functions of PEDOT:PSS composites has been also discussed. Herein, we introduce a prospective summary on the most recent advanced literatures in the origin of TE improvement, besides that the strategies and future efforts are proposed to facilitate future research. Truly, in this document we link the earlier works with the current ones; also this summary can be significantly useful for future research and may cover the strategy for developing more effectual organic thermoelectric materials.