Journal
IEEE SENSORS JOURNAL
Volume 15, Issue 6, Pages 3209-3220Publisher
IEEE-INST ELECTRICAL ELECTRONICS ENGINEERS INC
DOI: 10.1109/JSEN.2014.2386392
Keywords
Vibrational energy harvesting; nonlinear harvester; snap-through-buckling; inkjet printed; piezoelectric; interdigitated electrodes
Funding
- U.S. Office of Naval Research (Global)
- Office of Navel Research (ONR)
- U.S. Army International Technology Center (USAITC)
Ask authors/readers for more resources
This paper covers a novel methodology for the realization of devices that are able to harvest energy from background mechanical vibrations. The novelties reside in the nonlinear mechanism ruling the harvester behavior and the printed technology used to realize the lab-scale prototype. The nonlinearity of the harvester is desirable, because vibrational energy is usually distributed in a band at low frequency and does not, therefore, lend itself to harvesting through a (linear) resonant device. Printed technology has the advantage of being ultracheap and, hence, suitable for proof-of-concept and rapid laboratory prototyping. In particular, inkjet printing technology affords the realization of low-cost electrodes with high resolution and multiple functional layers. This paper covers the mechanical properties of a snap-through buckling beam and details the results of experiments aimed at investigating the (nonlinear) mechanical properties as well as a theoretical fit to the experimental observations. Moreover, the electrical response of the device and, hence, its suitability for energy-harvesting applications are addressed. Powers on the order of 100 nW have been experimentally estimated by a lab-scale prototype with the aim of demonstrating the proof-of-concept of the snap-through buckling mechanism for energy harvesting.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available