Nanophononic metamaterial: Thermal conductivity reduction by local resonance

TL;DR

This paper introduces a nanophononic metamaterial with local resonators that significantly reduces thermal conductivity, enhancing thermoelectric energy conversion by altering phonon spectra.

Contribution

It proposes a novel design of a silicon thin-film with pillars that hybridize phonon modes, leading to reduced thermal conductivity, a new approach in thermoelectric material engineering.

Findings

Thermal conductivity can be reduced to 50% of the original value.

Hybridization mechanism alters phonon spectrum effectively.

Design adds phonon modes while decreasing heat transfer.

Abstract

We present the concept of a locally resonant nanophononic metamaterial for thermoelectric energy conversion. Our configuration, which is based on a silicon thin-film with a periodic array of pillars erected on one or two of the free surfaces, qualitatively alters the base thin-film phonon spectrum due to a hybridization mechanism between the pillar local resonances and the underlying atomic lattice dispersion. Using an experimentally-fitted lattice-dynamics-based model, we conservatively predict a drop in the metamaterial thermal conductivity to as low as 50% of the corresponding uniform thin-film value despite the fact that the pillars add more phonon modes to the spectrum.