High-Performance AgSbTe Thermoelectrics: Advances, Challenges, and Perspectives.

Environmental-friendless and high-performance thermoelectrics play a significant role in exploring sustainable clean energy. Among them, AgSbTe thermoelectrics, benefiting from the disorder in the cation sublattice and interface scattering from secondary phases of AgTe and SbTe, exhibit low thermal conductivity and a maximum figure-of-merit ZT of 2.6 at 573 K via optimizing electrical properties and addressing phase transition issues. Therefore, AgSbTe shows considerable potential as a promising medium-temperature thermoelectric material. Additionally, with the increasing demands for device integration and portability in the information age, the research on flexible and wearable AgSbTe thermoelectrics aligns with contemporary development needs, leading to a growing number of research findings. This work provides a detailed and timely review of AgSbTe-based thermoelectrics from materials to devices. Principles and performance optimization strategies are highlighted for the thermoelectric performance enhancement in AgSbTe. The current challenges and future research directions of AgSbTe-based thermoelectrics are pointed out. This review will guide the development of high-performance AgSbTe-based thermoelectrics for practical applications.