RUNNING HEAD: THERMOELECTRCS 1

Hahnbee Lee

May 1, 2018

Thermoelectrics

Objective: To program the Raspberry Pi to read small currents

THERMOELECTRICS 2

Materials and Methods

In the past two weeks I have been trying my best to collect data from my previously

made samples. In order to do this I first tested out with my commercially bought peltier tiles. I

connected one peltier tile to a multimeter and a 9V battery to observe how much power was

coming out of the power input and then I connected another peltier tile and placed the one that

was connected to a power source on top of the one that was just connected to the ammeter to

observe the efficiency of the system. This was the test run just to make sure it worked. This

resulted in working and I was able to calculate both the current to measure the power in and

power out which thus helped me measure efficiency. I was able to obtain data for the power

inputted, not fully the power outputted because I wasn’t sure how to connect the multimeter in

parallel instead of in series with the peltier tile without the battery being a part of the system.

Thus, I was successfully able to measure in the power, current, and voltage going in to the

system, but I was only able to measure the current coming out of the system and not voltage.

Lastly, after I remotely successfully collected data for my control I changed the apparatus

so that I can now measure the data for my own thermocouple. However, one of two things may

have happened. The system may be completely flawed, and I may not be able to generate any

current from my curated thermocouple or since my thermocouple is a single thermocouple with

one joint connection it may not be able to read the small amount of current being emitted out of

it with the multimeter - hopefully it is the latter.

Taking the assumption that it is the latter, I am going to try to get my thermocouple

sensor from the raspberry pi to work. I had previously tried to get it to work to no avail because

my raspberry pi was from last year and whenever I try to start it up it seems incapable of turning

on from the start. I may try updating my raspberry pi and enabling the system to work to possibly
THERMOELECTRICS 3

try to measure the current with that. Additionally, instead of simply using the peltier tiles I may

try the ammeter set up that I currently have with some of the other control thermocouples I

purchased to compare and observe if I can get a current reading out of those.
THERMOELECTRICS 4

Data and Results

Current In (mA) Volts In Power In Current Out

(mA)

Peltier Tile 10 9V 0.09 30

Platinum 10 9V 0.09 0
Vanadium
Dioxide doped
thermocouple

For data collection I was able to obtain the current, potential and power going into the

system but I was incapable of measuring the voltage coming out and thus incapable of measuring

the power coming out. As for my thermocouple no current was seen being outputted from the

system I have now, but I may need to get a more precise instrument if it is emitting smaller

currents that the multimeter cannot read.

THERMOELECTRICS 5

References

Casten, S. (2009, September 12). How much energy does the U.S. waste? Retrieved October 17,

2017, from http://grist.org/article/2009-09-11-how-much-energy-does-the-us-waste/

Garnero, E.J., Mcnamara, A.K., & Shim. S. (2016). Continent-sized anomalous zones with low

seismic velocity at the base of Earth’s mantle. Nature Geoscience, 9(7), 481-489.

Doi:10.1038/ngeo2733

Iafolla, V., Nozzoli, S., & Fiorenza, E. (2003). One axis gravity gradiometer for the

measurement of Newtons gravitational constant G. Physics Letters A, 318(3), 223-233.

doi:10.1016/j.physleta.2003.07.014

L. (2013, December 17). I. P-Type, N-Type Semiconductors. Retrieved November 09, 2017,

from https://photon.libretexts.org/The_Science_of_Solar/Solar_Basics/D._P-

N_Junction_Diodes/I._P-Type%2C_N-Type_Semiconductors

Lee, S., Hippalgaonkar, K., Yang, F., Hong, J., Ko, C., Suh, J., . . . Wu, J. (2017). Anomalously

low electronic thermal conductivity in metallic vanadium dioxide. Science,355(6323),

371-374. doi:10.1126/science.aag0410

Liu, H., & Pike, W. T. (2016). A micromachined angular-acceleration sensor for geophysical

applications. Applied Physics Letters,109(17), 173506. doi:10.1063/1.4966547

Yang, S. (2017, January 26). For This Metal, Electricity Flows, But Not the Heat | Berkeley Lab.

Retrieved October 26, 2017, from http://newscenter.lbl.gov/2017/01/26/electricity-not-

heat-flows-in-vanadium-dioxide/