An electrochemical thermal transistor
Abstract
The ability to actively regulate heat flow at the nanoscale could be a game changer for applications in thermal management and energy harvesting. Such a breakthrough could also enable the control of heat flow using thermal circuits, in a manner analogous to electronic circuits. Here we demonstrate switchable thermal transistors with an order of magnitude thermal on/off ratio, based on reversible electrochemical lithium intercalation in MoS2 thin films. We use spatially-resolved time-domain thermoreflectance to map the lithium ion distribution during device operation, and atomic force microscopy to show that the lithiated state correlates with increased thickness and surface roughness. First principles calculations reveal that the thermal conductance modulation is due to phonon scattering by lithium rattler modes, c-axis strain, and stacking disorder. This study lays the foundation for electrochemically-driven nanoscale thermal regulators, and establishes thermal metrology as a useful probe of spatio-temporal intercalant dynamics in nanomaterials.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Pub Defense Publication
- Publication Date
- Oct 30, 2018
- Source ID
- 10.1038/s41467-018-06760-7
Entities
People
- Aditya Sood
- Connor J. Mcclellan
- Daniele Selli
- Davide Donadio
- Eric Pop
- Feng Xiong
- Haotian Wang
- Jie Sun
- Jinsong Zhang
- Kenneth E. Goodson
- Shunda Chen
- Yi Cui
Organizations
- Air Force Office of Scientific Research
- National Science Foundation
- United States Department of Energy