ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the authors introduce the melt-spinning (MS) and spark plasma system (SPS) techniques and summarize their results on high performance bulk Thermoelectric (TE) materials prepared by MS in combination with SPS; and offer them perspective and outlook for the MS technique followed by SPS. They present the details of an innovative route of a MS technique combined with a subsequent SPS process that they developed and applied to the synthesis of high-performance bulk TE materials with unique nanostructures, such as bulk p-type (Bi,Sb)2Te3, n-type filled CoSb3-based skutterudites, and p-type AgSbTe2 bulk materials. The authors discuss the MS technique to prepare TE materials with multiscale nanostructures, and explore SPS to preserve thermoelectrically favorable nanostructures in the bulk materials. High-performance nanostructured TE materials have been successfully produced using a unique nanostructuring approach: MS followed by SPS. The nanostructures of these single-element, melt-spinning and spark plasma sintering materials and their TE properties were all quite similar to the MS–SPS materials.
