Thermoelectric Effect of Buckypaper/Copper Assembly

Abstract

Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) exhibit excellent electrical and thermal properties that have been used in several device assemblies, such as electrode sheets made from an aggregate of CNTs, also called as buckypaper (BP). Despite that, the properties of single CNTs are reduced when randomly assembled to form a BP. In this way, this study investigated the thermoelectric effect of a BP electrode assembled on a copper electrode with an active area of 4.0 cm2. The micrographs were obtained by scanning electron microscopy and show morphology agglomerated of multiwalled CNTs, which permeated into the filter paper, forming a thickness of 67.33 μm. Moreover, indoor/outdoor tests were performed approaching the BP electrode from a heat source. Thus, the electrical responses in function of temperature variation show maximum thermovoltages of 9.0 mV and 40.73 mV from indoor and outdoor tests, respectively. Finally, an average Seebeck coefficient for the BP/copper electrodes array of 35.34 ± 6.0 mV/K was estimated from 298 to 304 K. These findings suggest that this assembly will be easily applied in thermoelectric device concepts.