Silicides: Materials for thermoelectric energy conversion

There are few silicides that could be used for thermoelectric energy conversion, following higher silicides of transition metals: CrSi2, MnSi1.75, β-FeSi2, Ru2Si3, ReSi1.75, and solid solutions based on compounds of Mg2X (X = Si, Ge, and Sn). Some of them have very high figures of merit (ZT). It can be shown that, in some silicides, a high ZT is the result of energy spectrum optimization besides the decrease in thermal conductivity. This is very difficult to achieve in some materials, because the density of states is typically dependent only on the band structure of a material, for which there is no means to produce such a change. However, in solid solutions, if they have a special band structure of components, it is possible to alter the band structure to increase ZT.