Improvement of crystal orientation and thermoelectric properties for hot pressed n- and p-type Bi2Te3 compounds

It is well known that the anisotropy of thermoelectric properties for hot pressed Bi₂Te₃ compounds is weaker than the single crystal and also the directionally solidified polycrystal. It has been suggested that an improvement in orientational distribution of crystals in hot pressed materials may give a higher figure of merit. In this work, we investigate the effect of the deformation process on the influence of the crystal orientational distribution for hot pressed n- and p-type Bi₂Te₃ compounds. It was found that the deformation process effected a change of crystal orientation distribution in the hot pressed materials and a higher anisotropy of thermoelectric properties was obtained