Zinc Oxide Nanowire Based Piezoelectric Nano Generators Grown on Flexible Substrates
- PDF / 11,446,052 Bytes
- 10 Pages / 612 x 792 pts (letter) Page_size
- 42 Downloads / 207 Views
Zinc Oxide Nanowire Based Piezoelectric Nano Generators Grown on Flexible Substrates M. Y. Soomro1, O. Nur1, and M. Willander1 1 Linköping University, Department of Science and Technology, SE-601 74 Norrköping, Sweden ABSTRACT Flexible substrates, like plastic, paper and cotton fabrics can be of interest for several reasons in connection to the appealing issue of generating voltage-current from piezoelectric ZnO nanowires (NWs). Zinc oxide NWs have shown very high voltage generation and they are possible to grown on plastic, paper and cotton. Since we with these substrates can get a new freedom to bend and also stretch the NWs and to incorporate them into new applications they are of great potential. Here we will describe the mechanical and piezoelectric properties of ZnO NWs grown on ordinary clean room paper and on cotton fabrics substrates as well as possibility of coating the ZnO NWs to maximize the output generated power. An enhancement of 160 times in the piezo-potential was observed from ZnO NWs coated with P3HT p-type polymer compared to non-coated NWs. INTRODUCTION Mechanical energy is in fact the most abundant source of energy around us. All what moves around and even inside us e.g. sound sonic waves, hydraulic flow water flow, mechanical vibrations, human body physical motion, human blood flow, human muscles motion etc.. are all sources of energy that are available all the time. Harvesting mechanical ambient energy is hence of potential in providing energy sources for even developing self-powered systems. The amount of energy in these mechanical ambient resources is varying in the order of magnitude and it can be relatively high e.g. ocean waves or relatively low e.g. human body muscle movements. Hence the type of mechanical energy to be harvested depends on the application. On the other hand nanostructures are emerging as possible building blocks for developing future smart electronic components. Bearing in mind the small amount of energy needed to drive a nano-device, harvesting suitable mechanical energy would probably be a realistic and applicable approach to power ‘’nano’’ systems. The size of the harvesting component on the other side is an important factor in the whole system. If the harvesting components is also based on nanostructures, the concept of a ‘’nano’’ system would be meaning full because the whole system will be small in size. Moreover, using nanostructures as building blocks for electronics components, has introduced another important concept. This important concept is the possible introduction of electronics in new environments through the use of non-conventional substrates like like e.g. plastic, paper, and textile fabrics. This is due to the possibility of synthesizing nanostructures on new these non-conventional substrates [1-3]. This will enable electronics in new environments and for new applications, e.g. smart textiles, implanted self-powered physiological sensors ect. Over the past several years, different nanomaterials have been the subject of numerous studies due to their un
Data Loading...
