ICT2014 Abstracts

In the thermoelectric-anisotropic media there is transverse to the temperature gradient electric field. At room temperature we have investigated the transverse thermopower in thin single-crystal Bi and Bi-Sn microwires for the purpose of using them in anisotropic thermoelectric generator. The single-crystal microwires in the diameter range 2 - 15 μm were prepared by the high frequency liquid phase casting in a glass capillary using an improved Ulitovsky technique; they were cylindrical single-crystals with (1011) orientation along the wire axis. In this orientation, the wire axis makes an angle of 19.5^o with the bisector axis C1 in the bisector-trigonal plane. It was found that in temperature range of 200 – 300 K doping of bismuth wires with tin increases the thermopower anisotropy in comparison with Bi by a factor of 2 – 3. The experimental model of the anisotropic thermoelectric generator (ATG) was created from long Bi-0.05at%Sn microwire in a glass coating (long microwire was coiled into a flat spiral so that at any point of the spiral axis C3 and microwire axis lying in a plane perpendicular to the flat spiral). For the single crystal microwire with a core diameter d = 2 µm, outer diameter D= 20 µm and a length of 8 m ATG can generate voltage U=1 V at a transverse temperature gradient (perpendicular to the flat spiral) of 5 K.