Quantitative measurement of figure of merit for transverse thermoelectric conversion in Fe/Pt metallic multilayers

Metallic multilayers play a pivotal role in spintronics and also have recently attracted attention as spin-caloritronic materials for energy conversion, but their thermoelectric performance has not been quantified. This study of Fe/Pt multilayers presents a method to evaluate the figure of merit for transverse thermoelectric conversion in thin-film stacks. A multilayered structure reduces thermal conductivity and notably enhances the figure of merit. Interestingly, epitaxial multilayers exhibit better thermoelectric performance than their polycrystalline counterparts, due to their higher transverse thermoelectric coefficient and electron-transport anisotropy.