Enhanced Thermoelectric Properties of Ag-Modified Bi0.5Sb1.5Te3 Composites by a Facile Electroless Plating Method

A large-scale and facile electroless plating Ag method has been developed to fabricate high-performing Ag/Bi0.5Sb1.5Te3 (Ag/BST) composites. Ag can be doped into BST and also forms Ag2Te secondary phase in BST, leading to a low lattice thermal conductivity of 0.34 Wm-1K-1. Consequently, a peak zT of 1.07 and average zT of 1.02 are achieved in 0.03wt% Ag/BST. The average zT value is enhanced by 100% in the temperature interval from 300 to 500 K compared with that of Ag-free BST. This work provides a facile and large-scale method to fabricate the high performance Bi2Te3-based alloy for applying in the low-temperature power generation.