Low temperature thermoelectric properties of Cu intercalated TiSe2: a charge density wave material

In this communication, we investigate the thermoelectric properties of a charge density wave material TiSe2 upon Cu intercalation. Polycrystalline Cu x TiSe2 (x=0–0.11) alloys were synthesized using solid state sintering process and their morphological and structural properties were investigated. The material grows in layered morphology and the c-lattice parameter increases linearly with x. The temperature dependent resistivity measured in the 300–5 K range, shows that increasing x leads to a systematic transition from charge density wave state to the metallic state. For x=0.11, the room temperature thermoelectric figure-of-merit is found to be 0.104, which is higher by seven orders in magnitude (i.e. 1.93×10−8) measured for pristine TiSe2 and comparable to the other reported thermoelectric materials. These results show that Cu x TiSe2 are a potential material for the low temperature thermoelectric applications.