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The international journal for inorganic, organometallic and bioinorganic chemistry



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Article citation: Ichiro Terasaki, Dalton Trans., 2010, DOI: 10.1039/b914661j

Novel thermoelectric properties of complex transition-metal oxides

Ichiro Terasaki, Manabu Iwakawa, Tomohito Nakano, Akira Tsukuda and Wataru Kobayashi

We report how the thermopower of complex transition-metal oxides is susceptible to small changes in material parameters. In the A-site ordered perovskite oxide R2/3Cu3Ti3.6Ru0.4O12, the thermopower changes from 15 to -100 V K-1 at 300 K in going from R = La to Er. We associate this with the hybridization between Cu 3d and Ru 4d electrons, which depends on R. For stronger hybridization, the Cu 3d electrons become more itinerant leading to positive thermopower. In the A-site ordered perovskite cobalt oxide Sr3YCo4O10.5, the spin state of the Co3+ ions determines the magnitude of the thermopower, where partial isovalent substitution (Ca for Sr and Rh for Co) enhances the thermopower whilst keeping the resistivity intact. These substitutions stabilize the low spin state of the Co3+ ions, which affects the thermopower through the entropy of the background for the carriers. We propose that the control of the magnetism plays a pivotal role in determining the thermopower in a certain class of complex oxides.

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