Abstract
As an emerging branch of energy conversion technologies, the triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) pioneers a brand‐new path to effectively harness varieties of mechanical energies for the purpose of powering and/or sensing. Since its invention in 2012, the TENG has experienced a booming and revolutionary development in every respect, ranging from materials synthesis and modification, architecture design to performance optimization, power management, and application exploration. In comparison to the organic solar cell and organic light‐emitting diodes, TENG is a unique technique that opens the venue of using polymer materials (PMs) for harvesting mechanical energy. So far, by virtue of superior charge transfer and capturing capabilities during friction, various kinds of PMs have been developed and used as triboelectric materials in order to achieve high‐performance TENGs. Here, this work focuses on the utilization and development of PMs for the TENGs technology and first gives a summary of main PMs that are frequently adopted in currently reported energy‐harvesting TENGs. Second, several kinds of PMs used lately in a few novel TENGs for special or specific energy‐harvesting circumstances are introduced and highlighted. Finally, the perspectives on and challenges in developing high‐performance PMs toward TENGs technology are conceived and expected to be instructive to future research.
Highlights
This work compared to classic metal and inorganic focuses on the utilization and development of polymer materials (PMs) for the triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) technology and first gives a summary of main PMs that are frequently adopted in currently reported energy-harvesting TENGs
For a single TENG, average power densities of 8.69 and 2.05 W m−3 could be obtained under ideal agitations and in water, respectively, indicating excellent mechanical energy-harvesting performance compared to existing similar devices.[53,55,56]
The results indicate that this type of TENG made of nylon and PTFE films is promising for directly powering a variety of commercial electronics and possible self-powered systems
Summary
Plenty of materials have been used to fabricate TENGs since its invention, due to the fact that almost all materials possess triboelectrification effect, from metal, to wool, to wood, and to PMs.[25]. Aihua Chen is an associate professor at Beihang University She received her bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees from Beijing University of Chemical Technology (BUCT). Chen Zhang received his Bachelors and Masters of Engineering in 2013 and 2016, respectively, from School of Materials Science and Engineering in Hefei University of Technology. He is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in materials physics and chemistry at Beihang University. His research on self-powered nanosystems has inspired the worldwide effort in academia and industry for studying energy for micro/nanosystems He coined and pioneered the fields of piezotronics and piezophototronics for third-generation semiconductors. Main types of PMs that adopted in currently developed TENGs are summarized based on several recent progress reports and their applications in diverse energy harvesting are described
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