Under the dedicated financing from the 863 Program, a research team, headed by Prof. ZHAO Xinbing, Zhejiang University, have synthesized Bi2Te3 nanotubes and nanobags, separately under a sealed high pressure environment over 100 ℃ and an open environment under 100℃, using water heating technique. At the 23rd International Thermoelectric Conference convened not along ago in Australia, Prof. ZHAO made a presentation titled "New Thermoelectric Bi2Te3 Nanotubes and Nanobags, Using Water Heating Technique". The paper has attracted great attention of ZHAO's counterparts both at home and abroad, being deemed as a new approach to develop innovative high performance thermoelectric materials, and a possible new direction leading to major breakthroughs. The paper is granted with the "Best Scientific Paper Award", the only honor conferred at the conference.

Researchers explain that Bi2Te3 makes not only the best thermoelectric material so far known to scientists near the indoor temperature, but also serves a stable binary compound of the largest atom number. It has a special quasi crystal lay structure. Theses features have also made Bi2Te3 nanotubes and nanobags of theoretical and application values for other fields in addition to thermoelectric materials.