Low-Cost Thermoelectric Material Works at Room Temperature

The widespread adoption of thermoelectric devices that can directly convert electricity into thermal energy for cooling and heating has been hindered, in part, by the lack of materials that are both inexpensive and highly efficient at room temperature. A new material was developed that works efficiently at room temperature while requiring almost no costly tellurium, a major component of the current state-of-the-art material. Future work could close the slight performance gap between the new material and the traditional material, a bismuth-tellurium-based alloy.