Aqueous chemical synthesis of tellurium nanowires using a polymeric template for thermoelectric materials

Abstract

We report the simple synthesis of tellurium nanowires (TeNWs) by a one-pot scale-up hydrothermal process. A clean wet-chemical method, employing telluric acid (Te(OH)₆) as a source of tellurium, ascorbic acid as a weak reducing agent, and a linear polymer as a template, has been developed for the synthesis of TeNWs with a diameter of 30–140 nm and a length of several micrometers at 105 °C. A possible explanation for the one-dimensional growth of TeNWs is the linear polymer template. The effects of the concentration of the polymeric template on the nanowire morphology were investigated. Evaluation of the thermoelectric properties indicated a high Seebeck coefficient and a power factor of about 568 μV K⁻¹ and 8.44 μW mK⁻², respectively, of the optimized TeNW films, and these values were about 80 times larger than those of the TeNW films formed without a polymeric template. We expect this simple process to be widely applicable for large-scale production of one-dimensional inorganic nanomaterials for energy harvesting and electronic devices.