In fact, we have some understanding or heard of refrigeration methods in our daily lives. For instance, common air conditioners use compressors for cooling, while semiconductor cooling is relatively less encountered in our daily lives. However, in recent years, the application scenarios of thermoelectric cooling in consumer products have increased, and it has gradually come into the view of ordinary people's lives, such as mobile phone heat dissipation back covers and in-car refrigerators in new energy vehicles, etc.
To better understand how TEC works, let's first take a look at its internal structure. The core of TEC is the semiconductor thermocouple (grain), which is generally divided into P-type and N-type.
“Extruded thermoelectric materials” refers to semiconducting compounds processed through extrusion—a manufacturing technique where material is forced through a die to form continuous shapes—optimized for thermoelectric energy conversion.
The illustration shows the schematic diagrams of the three major effects in our thermoelectric field: they are the Seebeck effect, the Peltier effect and the Thomson effect. This time, we are going to explore William Thomson and his great discovery - the Thomson effect.
In the early 19th century in Somme, France, a watchmaker named Jean-Charles Peltier (referred to as Peltier for short) calibrated the scales of countless hours with precise gears. However, when he put down the file and vernier caliper at the age of 30 and instead picked up the prism and the current meter, the intersection of his life path and the history of science was thus born - this former craftsman will be engraved on the milestone of thermoelectric physics as the discoverer of the "Peltier effect".
An apple shattered Newton's thoughts on universal gravitation. Then, who found the key to unlock the world of thermoelectricity? Let's step into the development history of TEC and the world of thermoelectricity.
