Energy harvesting technologies have been explored by researchers for more than two decades as an alternative to conventional power sources (e.g. batteries) for small-sized and low-power electronic devices. The limited life-time and necessity for periodic recharging or replacement of batteries has been a consistent issue in portable, remote, and implantable devices. Ambient energy can usually be found in the form of solar energy, thermal energy, and vibration energy. Amongst these energy sources, vibration energy presents a persistent presence in nature and manmade structures. Various materials and transduction mechanisms have the ability to convert vibratory energy to useful electrical energy, such as piezoelectric, electromagnetic, and electrostatic generators. Piezoelectric transducers, with their inherent electromechanical coupling and high power density compared to electromagnetic and electrostatic transducers, have been widely explored to generate power from vibration energy sources. A topical review of piezoelectric energy harvesting methods was carried out and published in this journal by the authors in 2007. Since 2007, countless researchers have introduced novel materials, transduction mechanisms, electrical circuits, and analytical models to improve various aspects of piezoelectric energy harvesting devices. Additionally, many researchers have also reported novel applications of piezoelectric energy harvesting technology in the past decade. While the body of literature in the field of piezoelectric energy harvesting has grown significantly since 2007, this paper presents an update to the authors' previous review paper by summarizing the notable developments in the field of piezoelectric energy harvesting through the past decade.

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1361-665X/ab36e4/pdf

A review of energy harvesting using piezoelectric materials: state-of-the-art a decade later (2008–2018)

A Review on Piezoelectric, Magnetostrictive, and Magnetoelectric Materials and Device Technologies for Energy Harvesting Applications

Mechanical modulations for enhancing energy harvesting: Principles, methods and applications

Stretchable piezoelectric energy harvesters and self-powered sensors for wearable and implantable devices

From last few decades, piezoelectric materials have played a vital role as a mechanism of energy harvesting, as they have the tendency to absorb energy from the environment and transform it to electrical energy that can be used to drive electronic devices directly or indirectly. The power of electronic circuits has been cut down to nano or micro watts, which leads towards the development of self-designed piezoelectric transducers that can overcome power generation problems and can be self-powered. Moreover, piezoelectric energy harvesters (PEHs) can reduce the need for batteries, resulting in optimization of the weight of structures. These mechanisms are of great interest for many researchers, as piezoelectric transducers are capable of generating electric voltage in response to thermal, electrical, mechanical and electromagnetic input. In this review paper, Fluid Structure Interaction-based, human-based, and vibration-based energy harvesting mechanisms were studied. Moreover, qualitative and quantitative analysis of existing PEH mechanisms has been carried out.

https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/11/7/1850/pdf

A Review on Mechanisms for Piezoelectric-Based Energy Harvesters

Piezoelectric energy harvesting from human motion is challenging because of the low energy conversion efficiency at a low-frequency excitation. Previous studies by the present authors showed that mechanical plucking of a piezoelectric bimorph cantilever was able to provide frequency up-conversion from a few hertz to the resonance frequency of the cantilever, and that a piezoelectric knee-joint energy harvester (KEH) based on this mechanism was able to generate sufficient energy to power a wireless sensor node. However, the direct contact between the bimorph and the plectra leads to reduced longevity and considerable noise. To address these limitations, this paper introduces a magnetic plucking mechanism to replace the mechanical plucking in the KEH, where primary magnets (PM) actuated by knee-joint motion excite the bimorphs through a secondary magnet (SM) fixed on the bimorphs tip and so achieve frequency up-conversion. The key parameters of the new KEH that affect the energy output of a plucked bimorph were investigated. It was found that the bimorph plucked by a repulsive magnetic force produced a higher energy output than an attractive force. The energy output peaked at 32 PMs and increased with a decreasing gap between PM and SM as well as an increasing rotation speed of the PMs. Based on these investigations, a KEH with high energy output was prototyped, which featured 8 piezoelectric bimorphs plucked by 32 PMs through repulsive magnetic forces. The gap between PM and SM was set to 1.5 mm with a consideration on both the energy output and longevity of the bimorphs. When actuated by knee-joint motion of 0.9 Hz, the KEH produced an average power output of 5.8 mW with a life time >7.3 h (about 3.8 × 105 plucking excitations).

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0964-1726/25/8/085029/pdf

Zhihao Yang

Papers

Design and characterisation of a piezoelectric knee-joint energy harvester with frequency up-conversion through magnetic plucking