Energy Science & Engineering (Mar 2020)

Building self‐powered emergency electronics based on hybrid nanogenerators for field survival/rescue

  • Xiaojing Cui,
  • Shengli Cao,
  • Rui Guo,
  • Saeed Ahmed Khan,
  • Gang Xie,
  • Zhigang Tian,
  • Shengbo Sang,
  • Hulin Zhang

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1002/ese3.497
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 8, no. 3
pp. 574 – 581

Abstract

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Abstract Harvesting energy from human body in multiple ways is pivotal for achieving powering emergency electronics effectively. Herein, we report a hybrid nanogenerator that is based on the coupling of a triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) and electromagnetic generator (EMG). By utilizing a copper coil in multiroles, the energy grabbing units can operate independently without interfering, revealing a superior performance in scavenging biomechanical energy from human motions. The hybrid device by encapsulation exhibits an excellent environmental stability. When wearing the fabricated device, the TENG and EMG can generate the output voltage about 4 and 1.5 V, respectively, which can be directly stored into a capacitor. By integrating with a battery, the established self‐powered device can actively provide a geographic coordinate in real time in the wild where there is no power supply or network connectivity. Our work paves a way for the further exploration based on hybrid nanogenerators in self‐powered wearable/portable emergency electronics that can be applied in exploration, travel, work, as well as rescue in the wild without power apply and Internet.

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