Flexible thermoelectric modules (TEMs) are often built with a polymer filler as structural support. However, the filler may serve as a thermal bypass, leading to reduced temperature difference across a TEM and degradation of the output. Herein, we present flexible TEMs made of porous PDMS fillers and Bi₂Te₃-based thermoelectric legs. The heat conduction through the filler is suppressed by leveraging the low thermal conductivity of porous PDMS (0.08 W/m∙K), leading to an increase in the temperature difference across the TEMs. The porous PDMS TEM exhibits 23% enhanced power density and a figure of merit (ZT) of 0.75 around the room temperature. Lastly, the efficacy of the porous PDMS TEM is demonstrated by testing the TEMs with body heat. Our approach would offer a promising insight into the flexible TEM designs.

柔性热电模块（TEM）通常以聚合物填料作为结构支撑物来构建。但是，填充物可能会用作热旁路，从而导致TEM上的温差减小，输出功率降低。本文中，我们介绍了由多孔PDMS填料和Bi ₂ Te ₃基热电腿制成的柔性TEM 。通过利用多孔PDMS的低导热率（0.08 W / m∙K），可以抑制通过填料的热传导，从而导致整个TEM的温差增加。多孔PDMS TEM具有23％的增强功率密度和品质因数（ZT）在室温下约0.75。最后，通过用体热测试TEM证明了多孔PDMS TEM的功效。我们的方法将为灵活的TEM设计提供有希望的见解。