BUSCADOR RECOLECTA

Digital.CSIC. Repositorio Institucional del CSIC

oai:digital.csic.es:10261/336926

9 pages. -- Table S1. Physical properties of all materials at 300K used in the finite element method simulations. -- Table S2. Internal resistance (R) of devices with hollow and filled thermoelectric legs assuming the temperature gradient (Tvarying) and without the temperature gradient (Tfixed) as well as the percentage between the two values. -- Figure S1. Relative percentage increase for G, R, and S as a function of the thermoelectric length. -- Figure S2. The (a) G, (b) R, and (c) S with filled and hollow thermoelectric leg geometries as a function of the thermoelectric leg cross-sectional area. -- Figure S3. Temperature profile along the TEG with filled and hollow thermoelectric legs geometries when a temperature difference of 100 K is applied on the devices. -- Figure S4. Temperature profile along the TEG with length of the thermoelectric legs at 0.2 mm for filled and hollow thermoelectric legs geometries cases. -- Figure S5. Open circuit voltage and output power as a function of the electrical current for the TEG with filled and hollow thermoelectric legs. -- Figure S6. Temperature profile along the TEG with hollow thermoelectric legs geometries measured at two different points., Thermoelectric materials capable of converting heat into electrical energy are used in sustainable electric generators, whose efficiency has been normally increased with incorporation of new materials with high figure of merit (ZT) values. Because the performance of these thermoelectric generators (TEGs) also depends on device geometry, in this study we employ the finite element method to determine optimized geometries for highly efficient miniaturized TEGs. We investigated devices with similar fill factors but with different thermoelectric leg geometries (filled and hollow). Our results show that devices with legs of hollow geometry are more efficient than those with filled geometry for the same length and cross-sectional area of thermoelectric legs. This behavior was observed for thermoelectric leg lengths smaller than 0.1 mm, where the leg shape causes a significant difference in temperature distribution along the device. It was found that for reaching highly efficient miniaturized TEGs, one has to consider the leg geometry in addition to the thermal conductivity., Peer reviewed