Enabling Oxidation Protection and Carrier-Type Switching for Bismuth Telluride Nanoribbons via <i>in Situ</i> Organic Molecule Coating

Thermoelectric materials with high electrical conductivity and low thermal conductivity (e.g., Bi2Te3) can efficiently convert waste heat into electricity; however, in spite of favorable theoretical predictions, individual Bi2Te3 nanostructures tend to perform less efficiently than bulk Bi2Te3. We report a greater-than-order-of-magnitude enhancement in the thermoelectric properties of suspended Bi2Te3 nanoribbons, coated in situ to form a Bi2Te3/F4-TCNQ core–shell nanoribbon without oxidizing the core–shell interface. The shell serves as an oxidation barrier but also directly functions as a strong electron acceptor and p-type carrier donor, switching the majority carriers from a dominant n-type carrier concentration (∼1021 cm–3) to a dominant p-type carrier concentration (∼1020 cm–3). Compared to uncoated Bi2Te3 nanoribbons, our Bi2Te3/F4-TCNQ core–shell nanoribbon demonstrates an effective chemical potential dramatically shifted toward the valence band (by 300–640 meV), robustly increased Seebeck coefficient (∼6× at 250 K), and improved thermoelectric performance (10–20× at 250 K)