Electromechanical coupling of a 3.88 W harvester with circumferential step-size field: modeling, validation and self-powered wearable applications

Abstract

The fast advances in wearable electronic devices require clean and wearable power sources. This study presents a wearable electromagnetic energy harvester (EMEH) with high output performance mounted on the knee to obtain human vibration energy. The design forms a circumferential step-change magnetic field with high electromechanical coupling for high-efficiency energy conversion. We first formulate a theoretical model and simulate the analytical voltage via MATLAB. To predict the output performance of the EMEH, we conduct simulations via ANSYS. Subsequently, experiments are conducted to explore the output performance of the harvester in terms of the voltage, the output power, and the charging rate. The prototype generates a peak power of 3.88 W with a 449 Ω resistor under the excitation of 2.0 Hz. Additionally, the prototype charges a battery to 33.9% within 300 s at a running speed of 8 km h−1. This study provides a new perspective for advancing the development of watt-level self-powered wearables.