Thermoelectric Measurement System

A thermoelectric (TE) material/device is a device that produces a voltage when a temperature difference is applied across it. Thermoelectric materials have the capability of being major resources in the modern quest of finding new sources of energy.  There are many thermoelectric materials known to scientists and observers alike today. However, many of these devices remain poorly understood due to the extremely small sizes of these devices (in our case nano-scale) and the limitations of present-day thermoelectric measurement techniques. In order to successfully identify and utilize such materials, it is important that we have a reliable and reproducible way to test the functionality, usefulness and efficiency of thermoelectric materials.  For this reason, an inexpensive thermoelectric measurement system is currently being developed at the NASA Ames Lab (Mountain view, CA) which will be able to effectively measure the thermal conductivity(ĸ), electrical conductivity(σ), Seebeck coefficient(s), Figure of Merritt(z)  and most importantly the efficiency(η) of a nano-scale thermoelectric device.  The thermoelectric measurement apparatus utilizes a combination of hardware (Vacuum pot, Data Acquisition Device, Heater, Heat-sink) and software (LabView) interfaces to perform physical actions on the device under testing, quantize the affects of those actions and store that information. If we are successful in developing this apparatus, we will have created an extremely accessible way of acquiring important information of thermoelectric materials and in effect greatly catalyze the quest to develop an efficient thermoelectric device whose main application will be converting heat to electric power.