Abstract
Generation of electric power by the Nernst effect is a new application of a semiconductor. A key point of this new proposal is to find materials with a good figure of merit of the Nernst effect, which is called a Nernst element. We propose InSb as a candidate for the Nernst element, because an electron mobility of InSb is very high at room temperature. Transport coefficients of InSb between 100K and 400K are given by the Boltzmann equation with a parabolic two-band model for an acoustic-phonon scattering process. Maxwell-Boltzmann distribution function is used as a non-perturbed distribution function. Our formulations with these approximation give the same temperature dependence as experiments for conductivity, Hall coefficient, and thermoelectric power. It is concluded that the acoustic-phonon scattering process is dominant in this region. However the Nernst coefficient given by the Boltzmann equation with the above conditions is not coincident with the result of experiments. This is a future problem.
