High-Performance n-type Organic Thermoelectric Aerogels Toward Flexible Energy Harvesting and Sensing Devices

Abstract

Thermoelectric generators are one type of energy device widely used for wearable and flexible electronics to provide power to other devices. Organic aerogels with excellent thermoelectric and mechanical properties are promising candidates for such applications, but most of high-performance organic aerogels are made of p-type materials. It remains a great challenge to develop a low-cost and air-stable n-type organic aerogels with comparable performance with the state-of-the-art p-type counterparts to form an efficient thermoelectric power generator. In this study, a novel strategy based on a cellulose nanofiber skeleton is developed to form a high-performance n-type organic aerogel. The obtained n-type organic aerogels possess a Seebeck coefficient of −17 µV K⁻¹ and can combine with their p-type counterparts to form a generator outputting 1 µW with a temperature difference of 50 K. Using the n-type organic aerogels, dual-parameter pressure and temperature sensing with high precision and reproducibility can be realized. The n-type aerogel will find its applications not only for outdoor self-powered systems, but also for human health diagnosis systems with real-time monitoring of multiple parameters without crosstalk.