Power-generating rubber films developed by Princeton University engineers could harness natural body movements such as breathing and walking to power pacemakers, mobile phones and other electronic devices.


   The piezzoelectric material, composed of ceramic nanoribbons embedded onto silicone rubber sheets, generates electricity when flexed and is highly efficient at converting mechanical energy to electrical energy. Shoes made of the material may one day harvest the pounding of walking and running to power mobile electrical devices. This special characteristics of material makes it possible to be placed against the lungs, sheets of the material which could use breathing motions to power pacemakers, obviating the current need for surgical replacement of the batteries that power the devices.


   A paper on the new material entitled "Piezoelectric Ribbons Printed Onto Rubber for Flexible Energy Conversion," was published online Jan. 26 in Nano Letters, a journal of the American Chemical Society. The research was funded by the U.S. Intelligence Community, a cooperative of federal intelligence and national security agencies.


   The Princeton team becomes the first to successfully combine silicone and nanoribbons of lead zirconate titanate (PZT), a ceramic material that is piezoelectric, meaning it generates an electrical voltage when pressure is applied to it. Unlike quartz (a common piezzoelectric material), PZT is 100 times more efficient, able to convert 80 percent of the mechanical energy applied to it into electrical energy. 

   In addition to generating electricity when it is flexed, the opposite is true: The material flexes when electrical current is applied to it. This opens the door to other kinds of applications, such as use for microsurgical devices, McAlpine said.



   "The beauty of this is that it's scalable," said Yi Qi, a postdoctoral researcher who works with McAlpine. "As we get better at making these chips, we'll be able to make larger and larger sheets of them that will harvest more energy."

   This revolutionary technology has created brights up the future of Nanotechnology and provide a better insights for future development of piezzoelectric materials.

Source:
- Princeton University (News)
- Nano Letters Publication: "Piezoelectric Ribbons Printed Onto Rubber for Flexible Energy Conversion"