Harvesting Electrical Energy from High Temperature Environment by Aerogel Nano‐Covered Triboelectric Yarns

Abstract

AbstractIntegrating power into fabrics offers exciting opportunities for wearable technologies, which has long remained challenging to make flexible, high temperature resistant textile‐based powers. Here, an all yarns‐based triboelectric nanogenerator (Y‐TENG) is proposed to harvest electrical energy and sense biological motion for temperatures between 25 and 400 °C, the upper limit of temperature is greatly improved. The Y‐TENG is capable of outputting a transferred charge density of 30 nC cm−2, the external load resistance is 180 MΩ, and the peak power reaches 0.17 mW, and the average response time is lower than 15 ms. Based on a simple processing strategy, when introducing silica aerogel during electrospinning of polyimide nano‐covered layer to make multi‐ply and stabilized triboelectric yarns. Unlike ordinary fibers and yarns, the core‐shell structured design also shows a high sensitivity to all kinds of mechanical triggering sources. Furthermore, a self‐powered movement characteristic monitoring system by coordinating smart protective suit is further developed to provide real‐time sensing and rescuing assistance. This aerogel nano‐covered triboelectric yarn has great application prospects for energy generation and motion detection in high‐temperature and many other high‐risk environments.