The analysis of piezomagnetoelastic energy harvesters under broadband random excitations

This paper presents an analysis of piezomagnetoelastic energy harvesters under broadband random ambient excitations for the purpose of powering low-power electronic sensor systems. Their nonlinear behavior as a result of vibration in a magnetic field makes piezomagnetoelastic energy harvesters different from classical piezoelastic energy harvesters. An equivalent linearization-based analytical approach is developed for the analysis of harvested power. A closed-form approximate expression for the ensemble average of the harvested power is derived and validated against numerical Monte Carlo simulation results. Our results show that it is possible to optimally design the system such that the mean harvested power is maximized for a given strength of the input broadband random ambient excitation. (C) 2011 American Institute of Physics. [doi:10.1063/1.3560523]