An Ultrathin Flexible Single-Electrode Triboelectric-Nanogenerator for Mechanical Energy Harvesting and Instantaneous Force Sensing

The trends in miniaturization of electronic devices give rise to the attention of energy harvesting technologies that gathers tiny wattages of power. Here this study demonstrates an ultrathin flexible single electrode triboelectric nanogenerator (S-TENG) which not only could harvest mechanical energy from human movements and ambient sources, but also could sense instantaneous force without extra energy. The S-TENG, which features an extremely simple structure, has an average output current of 78 mu A, lightening up at least 70 LEDs (light-emitting diode). Even tapped by bare finger, it exhibits an output current of 1 mu A. The detection sensitivity for instantaneous force sensing is about 0.947 mu A MPa-1. Performances of the device are also systematically investigated under various motion types, press force, and triboelectric materials. The S-TENG has great application prospects in sustainable wearable devices, sustainable medical devices, and smart wireless sensor networks owning to its thinness, light weight, energy harvesting, and sensing capacities.