Self-Powered Wireless Sensor Node Enabled by a Duck-Shaped Triboelectric Nanogenerator for Harvesting Water Wave Energy

This paper presents a fully enclosed duck-shaped triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) for effectively scavenging energy from random and low-frequency water waves. The design of the TENG incorporates the freestanding rolling mode and the pitch motion of a duck-shaped structure generated by incident waves. By investigating the material and structural features, a unit of the TENG device is successfully designed. Furthermore, a hybrid system is constructed using three units of the TENG device. The hybrid system achieves an instantaneous peak current of 65.5 mu A with an instantaneous output power density of up to 1.366 W m(-2). Following the design, a fluid-solid interaction analysis is carried out on one duck-shaped TENG to understand the dynamic behavior, mechanical efficiency, and stability of the device under various water wave conditions. In addition, the hybrid system is experimentally tested to enable a commercial wireless temperature sensor node. In summary, the unique duck-shaped TENG shows a simple, cost-effective, environmentally friendly, light-weight, and highly stable system. The newly designed TENG is promising for building a network of generators to harvest existing blue energy in oceans, lakes, and rivers.