Next-generation wearable electronics could be powered by a device worn in footwear, according to researchers at the Hahn-Schickard-Gesellschaft Institute for Micromachining and Information Technology.
The team has developed devices that would harness the power from a person's walking gait. The shock harvester generates power when the heel of a shoe strikes the ground, while the swing harvester generates power when the foot is swinging. Utilizing the motion between magnets and coils, the shock harvester has been able to generate a maximum of 4.13 mW of power when a test subject was traveling at 5 km/h on solid ground, and the swing harvester generates an average power output of 0.84 mW. Both energy-harvesting devices were used to power a temperature sensor in a shoe, generating enough power for the temperature readings to be wirelessly transmitted over 10 meters to a handheld device.
The team still must investigate the durability of both devices. "As a demonstrator we have added simple power-management electronics to the harvesters, which only rectify the voltage and immediately use all available energy from the harvester to measure the temperature and transmit the data wirelessly to a mobile device," notes Hahn-Schickard-Gesellschaft Institute researcher Klevis Ylli. "This was to prove that the immediate power output of the devices suffices for wireless transmissions."
From The Engineer (United Kingdom)
View Full Article
Abstracts Copyright © 2015 Information Inc., Bethesda, Maryland, USA
No entries found