Thermoelectricity of Wigner crystal in a periodic potential

TL;DR

This study numerically investigates the thermoelectric properties of a classical Wigner crystal in a periodic potential, revealing high Seebeck coefficients and optimal conditions for thermoelectric efficiency near the Aubry transition.

Contribution

The paper demonstrates that the Aubry pinned phase of a Wigner crystal exhibits exceptionally high Seebeck coefficients and significant thermoelectric performance, providing insights into optimizing thermoelectric materials.

Findings

Seebeck coefficient reaches hundreds in the Aubry pinned phase.

Charge and thermal conductivity decrease significantly in the Aubry phase.

Maximum ZT factor of 4.5 observed near the Aubry transition.

Abstract

We study numerically the thermoelectricity of the classical Wigner crystal placed in a periodic potential and being in contact with a thermal bath modeled by the Langevin dynamics. At low temperatures the system has sliding and pinned phases with the Aubry transition between them. We show that in the Aubry pinned phase the dimensionless Seebeck coefficient can reach very high values of several hundreds. At the same time the charge and thermal conductivity of crystal drop significantly inside this phase. Still we find that the largest values of $ZT$ factor are reached in the Aubry phase and for the studied parameter range we obtain $ZT \leq 4.5$. We argue that this system can provide an optimal regime for reaching high $ZT$ factors and realistic modeling of thermoelecriticy. Possible experimental realizations of this model are discussed.