Triboelectric effect in emerging energy and self-powered sensing devices

Ying-Chih Lai^1*

¹材料系, 中興大學, 台北市, Taiwan

* Presenter:Ying-Chih Lai, email:lai423@gmail.com

Deformable and wearable devices (including sensors, electronics, and machines) have
attracted great interest because they cannot only extend the scope of smart systems but also provide compliant and safer user experience. Operating those devices inevitably need power sources. However, traditional batteries suffer from heavy weight, bulky volume, and limited capacity and lifetime, hindering the progress and practical uses of those emerging devices. Toward the soft future, it is necessary to explore new energy technology. In this talk, energy-harvesting triboelectric nanogenerators will be demonstrated for not only serving as new energy providers but also self-powered sensing uses. First, stretchable triboelectric nanogenerators will be presented. Particularly, even experiencing severe tearing damages, the device can retain its functionality to act as a power source for other components. Such technology can also be introduced for wearable energy and fabric-based self-powered sensing uses. Then, we will discuss the use in self-powered artificial electronic skins that can actively sense proximity, contact, and pressure to external stimuli via self-generating electricity. Further, the perfect integration of the tribo-skins and soft actuators enables robots to perform various actively sensing and interactive tasks. Subsequently, a self-healing, highly-transparent, and super-stretchable triboelectric nanogenerator with energy-extracting and activity-sensing abilities will be demonstrated in the use of self-powered electronic skin, human-interactive interfaces, and so forth. Last, we will also introduce examples for the integration of 2D-material devices with triboelectric nanogenerators. These works may open the crucial doors for the tremendous potentials of wearable/stretchable/deformable electronics, artificial electronic-sensory skins, and smart interfaces.

Keywords: triboelectric nanogenerators , electronic skins, flexible devices

Keywords: triboelectric nanogenerators, electronic skins, flexible devices, 2D devices