Interlaminar Fracture Toughness Measurement of Multilayered 2D Thermoelectric Materials Bi2Te3 by a Tapered Cantilever Bending Experiment

P. Wang, K. F. Wang, B. L. Wang, L. Xi*, K. Sano, T. Shimada, H. Hirakata*, D. N. Fang

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

5 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Background: Multilayered thermoelectric material bismuth telluride (Bi2Te3) is widely used in engineering owing to its exceptional thermoelectric performance at room temperature. However, Bi2Te3 is prone to cracks, voids, or other defects due to its multilayered structure, leading to decreased device lifetime and reliability. Objective: This paper aims at stably and precisely measuring the interlaminar fracture toughness (IFT) of multilayered Bi2Te3 for the reliability evaluation of Bi2Te3-based thermoelectric devices. In addition, we seek a method to stably measure the IFT even for very brittle materials. Methods: We developed a tapered cantilever bending (TCB) experiment to obtain the IFT. The experimental specimens were fabricated using a focused ion beam (FIB) technique at the micro scale, and the initial interlaminar crack was introduced by the notch method. Results: By performing the TCB experiment, we created an ideally sharp pre-crack and observed stable crack propagation. The critical energy release rate (ERR) for crack propagation obtained in the present paper is around 0.51–0.53 J/m2, which agrees reasonably with theoretical van der Waals (vdW) interlaminar interaction energy. Conclusions: The proposed method can be well-applied in assessing IFTs of multilayered materials, even for very brittle multilayered 2D materials.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)165-180
Number of pages16
JournalExperimental Mechanics
Volume62
Issue number1
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Jan 2022

Keywords

  • Interlaminar fracture toughness
  • Multilayered 2D materials
  • Tapered cantilever bending
  • Thermoelectric materials

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Interlaminar Fracture Toughness Measurement of Multilayered 2D Thermoelectric Materials Bi2Te3 by a Tapered Cantilever Bending Experiment'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this

Wang, P., Wang, K. F., Wang, B. L., Xi, L., Sano, K., Shimada, T., Hirakata, H., & Fang, D. N. (2022). Interlaminar Fracture Toughness Measurement of Multilayered 2D Thermoelectric Materials Bi2Te3 by a Tapered Cantilever Bending Experiment. Experimental Mechanics, 62(1), 165-180. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11340-021-00761-2