Fabric Harvests Solar, Motion Energy to Power Wearables, Textiles
Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology have developed fabric that can simultaneously harvest energy from both sunshine and motion.
September 27, 2016
Researchers have been developing various ways to power wearable technology and clothing without the need for bulky batteries that make these devices and materials less user friendly. In a new approach, researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology have developed fabric that can simultaneously harvest energy from both sunshine and motion, providing a potentially continuous power source for wearable technology and clothing.
Indeed, the aim of the research was to develop “a wearable, flexible uninterruptible power source, which could be better integrated with our clothes and could work day and night,” Zhong Lin Wang, a Regents professor in the Georgia Tech School of Materials Science and Engineering and leader of the team that created the fabric, told Design News.
“Energies associated with a human are mostly solar and mechanical,” Wang said. “Here, a micro-cable-structured textile was presented to simultaneously harvest energy from ambient sunshine and natural human biomechanical movement for portable electronics, which could sustainably drive an electronic watch and directly charge a cell phone [while they are being worn].”
Other benefits of the material is that it is highly breathable, flexible, and can adapt to human surface curves and biomechanical movement.
Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology have developed a fabric that can harvest energy from both the sun and motion. (Source: Georgia Institute of Technology)
To make the fabric, the team used commonly used materials and methods that can easily be reproduced and scaled for broader use in garments or even curtains or tents, Wang said.
“The whole textile is assembled on lightweight, cheap, and flexible polymer fibers via a low-temperature wet process with earth-abundant, low-cost materials,” he said. “The backbone of the textile is made from commonly used polymer materials. Similar devices could also be fabricated based on other flexible materials. Furthermore, the fabrication process of the electrode is a low-temperature wet process, which is energy-saving and compatible with possible large-scale manufacturing.”
Using a commercial textile machine, researchers weaved together solar cells constructed from lightweight polymer fibers with fiber-based triboelectric nanogenerators. These type of nanogenerators use a combination of the triboelectric effect and electrostatic induction to generate electricity from mechanical motion such as rotation, sliding, or vibration. This movement could include materials rubbing together before being separated, Wang said.