Wearable Thermoelectric Devices Based on Au-Decorated Two-Dimensional MoS₂

Abstract

Two-dimensional (2D) materials have recently opened a new avenue to flexible thermoelectric materials with enhanced performance because of their unique electronic transport properties. Here, we report a feasible approach to improve the thermoelectric performance of transition-metal dichalcogenides by effectively decorating 2D MoS₂ with Au nanoparticles using in situ growth. The present Au-decorated MoS₂-assembled heterojunction system shows a certain decoupled phenomenon, that is, the Seebeck coefficient and conductivity increased simultaneously. This is due to the occurrence of p-type doping of the MoS₂ 2H phase and injection energy filtering of dopant-originated carriers around the local band bending at the interface. The composite flexible films can achieve a power factor value of 166.3 μW m^-1 K^-2 at room temperature, which have great potential for harvesting human body heat.