A cantilever-driven rotor for efficient vibration energy harvesting

Abstract The pervasive renewable vibration energy has been considered as a promising alternative to electrochemical energy of batteries for powering wireless sensors and wearable electronics, but its efficient harvesting is still an unsolved problem. To tackle this issue, this paper presents an innovative mechanical modulation mechanism, which we name ‘cantilever-driven rotor’, to convert vibrations to uni-directional rotation aiming to achieve improved energy harvesting performance. Compared with the conventional cantilever-based energy harvesters (CBEHs), the rotor-based energy harvester (RBEH) can provide both enhanced output power (1.8 mW versus 0.3 mW) and extended working bandwidth (4.5 Hz versus 1.9 Hz) under a harmonic vibration of 0.8 g (1 g = 9.8 m/s2). Moreover, electric outputs of the RBEH can persist for 27 s after the external excitation vanishes. With the electric energy generated by the RBEH from the harmonic vibration, a wireless acceleration sensor could be powered to perform with its full functionality. When attached to the human ankle, the RBEH can maintain the normal operation of a Timer under a walking speed of 6 km/h. This work provides a basically different vibration-to-rotation conversion mechanism with superior performance in vibration energy exploitation and potential applications in self-sustained wireless sensors and wearable electronics.

[1]  Yiannos Manoli,et al.  Energy harvesting from human motion: exploiting swing and shock excitations , 2015 .

[2]  Qinxue Tan,et al.  Improved energy harvesting from low-frequency small vibrations through a monostable piezoelectric energy harvester , 2019, Mechanical Systems and Signal Processing.

[3]  D. Inman,et al.  Frequency Self-tuning Scheme for Broadband Vibration Energy Harvesting , 2010 .

[4]  Huicong Liu,et al.  A comprehensive review on piezoelectric energy harvesting technology: Materials, mechanisms, and applications , 2018, Applied Physics Reviews.

[5]  L. Gammaitoni,et al.  Nonlinear energy harvesting. , 2008, Physical review letters.

[6]  L. Zuo,et al.  Energy-harvesting shock absorber with a mechanical motion rectifier , 2013 .

[7]  M. A. Halim,et al.  An electromagnetic rotational energy harvester using sprung eccentric rotor, driven by pseudo-walking motion , 2018 .

[8]  Liya Zhao,et al.  A two-degree-of-freedom string-driven rotor for efficient energy harvesting from ultra-low frequency excitations , 2020 .

[9]  Zhong Lin Wang,et al.  Robust Triboelectric Nanogenerator Achieved by Centrifugal Force Induced Automatic Working Mode Transition , 2020, Advanced Energy Materials.

[10]  Chengkuo Lee,et al.  A non-resonant rotational electromagnetic energy harvester for low-frequency and irregular human motion , 2018, Applied Physics Letters.

[11]  Shengxi Zhou,et al.  High-Performance Piezoelectric Energy Harvesters and Their Applications , 2018 .

[12]  Yaowen Yang,et al.  A nonlinear piezoelectric energy harvester with magnetic oscillator , 2012 .

[13]  K. Fan,et al.  Exploiting ultralow-frequency energy via vibration-to-rotation conversion of a rope-spun rotor , 2020 .

[14]  Shengxi Zhou,et al.  Achieving high-speed rotations with a semi-flexible rotor driven by ultralow-frequency vibrations , 2020 .

[15]  Eric M. Yeatman,et al.  A methodology for low-speed broadband rotational energy harvesting using piezoelectric transduction and frequency up-conversion , 2017 .

[16]  Yilun Liu,et al.  Design, Modeling, Lab, and Field Tests of a Mechanical-Motion-Rectifier-Based Energy Harvester Using a Ball-Screw Mechanism , 2017, IEEE/ASME Transactions on Mechatronics.

[17]  Meiling Zhu,et al.  Broadband energy harvesting by nonlinear magnetic rolling pendulum with subharmonic resonance , 2019 .

[18]  Xiaobiao Shan,et al.  Enhancing the performance of an underwater piezoelectric energy harvester based on flow-induced vibration , 2019, Energy.

[19]  Qinxue Tan,et al.  A string-suspended and driven rotor for efficient ultra-low frequency mechanical energy harvesting , 2019, Energy Conversion and Management.

[20]  Kexiang Wei,et al.  Mechanical modulations for enhancing energy harvesting: Principles, methods and applications , 2019 .

[21]  Chuanyu Wu,et al.  Scavenging vibrational energy with a novel bistable electromagnetic energy harvester , 2020, Smart Materials and Structures.

[22]  Fei Wang,et al.  An inertial rotary energy harvester for vibrations at ultra-low frequency with high energy conversion efficiency , 2020 .

[23]  Yang Kuang,et al.  Strongly coupled piezoelectric energy harvesters: Finite element modelling and experimental validation , 2020 .

[24]  Fei Wang,et al.  Rotational electromagnetic energy harvester for human motion application at low frequency , 2020, Applied Physics Letters.

[25]  S. Shahruz.  Design of mechanical band-pass filters for energy scavenging , 2006 .

[26]  Lihua Tang,et al.  Enhanced electrostatic vibrational energy harvesting using integrated opposite-charged electrets , 2017 .

[27]  Daniel J. Inman,et al.  An experimentally validated bimorph cantilever model for piezoelectric energy harvesting from base excitations , 2009 .

[28]  Won Seop Hwang,et al.  Piezoelectric device operating as sensor and harvester to drive switching circuit in LED shoes , 2019, Energy.

[29]  Li Haitao,et al.  Dynamics and coherence resonance of tri-stable energy harvesting system , 2015 .

[30]  Yaowen Yang,et al.  Toward Broadband Vibration-based Energy Harvesting , 2010 .

[31]  Qinxue Tan,et al.  A nonlinear two-degree-of-freedom electromagnetic energy harvester for ultra-low frequency vibrations and human body motions , 2019, Renewable Energy.

[32]  Daniel J. Inman,et al.  Nonlinear time-varying potential bistable energy harvesting from human motion , 2015 .

[33]  K. Fan,et al.  Scavenging energy from ultra-low frequency mechanical excitations through a bi-directional hybrid energy harvester , 2018 .

[34]  J. Miao,et al.  Origami-inspired electret-based triboelectric generator for biomechanical and ocean wave energy harvesting , 2020, Nano Energy.

[35]  Shengxi Zhou,et al.  Nonlinear dynamic analysis of asymmetric tristable energy harvesters for enhanced energy harvesting , 2018, Commun. Nonlinear Sci. Numer. Simul..

[36]  Qinxue Tan,et al.  A monostable piezoelectric energy harvester for broadband low-level excitations , 2018 .

[37]  Xiao Hu,et al.  A novel two-degree-of-freedom MEMS electromagnetic vibration energy harvester , 2016 .

[38]  Lihua Tang,et al.  Efficiency investigation on energy harvesting from airflows in HVAC system based on galloping of isosceles triangle sectioned bluff bodies , 2019, Energy.

[39]  Marco Ferrari,et al.  Piezoelectric multifrequency energy converter for power harvesting in autonomous microsystems , 2008 .