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Silver

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Thermal, Electrical, And Structural Behavior Of Silver Chalcogenide Composites, Jeremy Capps Jan 2011

Thermal, Electrical, And Structural Behavior Of Silver Chalcogenide Composites, Jeremy Capps

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In this thesis and the contained publications, it is demonstrated that it is not only possible to improve the dimensionless figure of merit (ZT) of silver chalcogenide composites, but it is also possible to move the maximum ZT value into a more favorable temperature range for power production. It is shown that by introducing disorder, stress, and phase competition into a system, a reduction in the material's thermal conductivity can be realized. The binaries Ag2Te and Ag2Se are re-examined in detail before moving on to examine Ag2Te1-xSex composites. The maximum ZT (ZT = 0.92) of Ag2Te0.5Se0.5 is measured at T= …