Ternary Ag2Se1–xTex: A Near-Room-Temperature Thermoelectric Material with a Potentially High Figure of Merit

Discovering high-performance near-room-temperature thermoelectric materials is extremely imperative to widen the practical application in thermoelectric power generation and refrigeration. Here, ternary Ag2Se1–xTex (x = 0.1, 0.2, 0.3, 0.4, and 0.5) materials are prepared via the wet-mechanical alloying and spark plasma sintering process to investigate their near-room-temperature thermoelectric properties. From density functional theory calculation and single-parabolic-band modeling study, we found that the reduced contribution of Se 4p orbitals to the total density of states decreases the carrier effective mass with increasing Te content, which should enhance the theoretically maximum zT. These calculation results are also verified by the experimental results. Meanwhile, complex microstructures including dislocations, nanograins, high-density boundaries, TeSe substitution, lattice distortions, and localized strain have been observed in ternary Ag2Se1–xTex. These complex microstructures strengthen phonon scattering and in turn lead to ultralow lattice thermal conductivity in the range of 0.21–0.31 W m–1 K–1 in ternary Ag2Se1–xTex at 300 K. Although the increased deformation potential suppresses the carrier mobility, benefiting from the engineered band structures and ultralow lattice thermal conductivity, a high zT of >1 can be potentially obtained in the ternary Ag2Se1–xTex with appropriate carrier concentration. This study indicates that ternary Ag2Se1–xTex is a promising candidate for near-room-temperature thermoelectric applications.