A Novel Thermoelectric System with Conductive Metal Rods and its Effective Seebeck Coefficients

A novel linked thermoelectric system (LTES), fabricated by a simple structural modification of a conventional thermoelectric system (CTES) with the use of conductive metal rods, is characterized experimentally. The LTES generates higher power to the external load in comparison with the CTES, and the power increases with increasing length of the metal rods when the low temperature side of the system is set in the air at room temperature. In addition, measurements of Seebeck voltages of both the systems indicate that the Seebeck coefficient of thermoelectric materials in the LTES is about 1.2 times higher than that in the CTES.