Colloquia

Seminars

• Astronomy and Space Physics
• Atomic, Molecular, and Optical Physics
• Condensed Matter
• Fluids and Plasmas
• Particle Physics
• Calendar of Events

Graduation Commencement

Condensed Matter Seminar

Date: Nov 29 (217A Sharp Lab at 2:00pm)

Speaker: Keivan Esfarjani, Physics Department, Sharif University, Iran

Title: Thermoelectric properties of a nanocontact

Abstract:

With the increasing number of transistors in a chip, the heat produced in the chip is also increased. Its efficient evacuation is now one of the challenges chip makers are facing. The efficiency of coolers is measured by the figure of merit ZT which is about 2 for the best thermoelectric semiconductors made up to now. As a comparison, ZT of compressor-based refrigerators is 4. In this talk, we briefly review thermoelectric effects and then will discuss the resutls of our transport calculations for a point contact made out of two nanotubes whose caps are facing each other. Preliminary results for coherent quantum transport of electrons indicate that a ZT of 100 can be achieved in this device.