Anisotropic thermoelectric devices made from single crystal semimetal microwires

Abstract

We studied the possibility of using glass-insulated Bi and Bi-Sn microwires to design an anisotropic thermoelectric generator (ATG) and a heat flux sensor (HFS) [1,2]. Glass-coated single-crystal microwires of pure and Sn-doped bismuth were prepared by the Ulitovsky method. Theoretically, in anisotropic thermoelectric crystals, the electric potential is perpendicular to the heat flow and is proportional to the temperature difference of the isothermal faces, the thermopower anisotropy and the crystal length, and inversely proportional to the height of the crystal. An anisotropic thermoelement (AT) can be made from a single-crystal microwire of suitable dimensions without any thermoelectric junctions.