Mechanical switches integrated sandwich triboelectric nanogenerator with high instantaneous output power

Abstract

Triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) has emerged as a promising energy harvester that converts random mechanical energy in the environment into electricity to enable self-powered system construction. However, the conventional TENG exhibits a large internal resistance resulting in a low output power across external loads for practical application. In this work, the travel mechanical switches were integrated into the TENG to boost output power, where the switches were turned on and off by the periodic motion between the triboelectric layers. Moreover, the triboelectric layers of TENG were developed as contact separation sandwich structures to work with mechanical switches, allowing the device to release the co-accumulated charges from the dual triboelectric layer to yield giant instantaneous discharge. Compared to a conventional TENG, the device offers ~2.8 times more transfer charge in one cycle and ~106 times more instantaneous power at an external load of 500 Ω, which renders the internal impedance match almost negligible. As a result, the high-power source demonstrates the ability to illuminate the commercial lamps in parallel (total power: 50 W). Such a unique TENG with high output power for low resistance load could greatly enrich the practical application fields of self-powered systems.