Human Skin Based Triboelectric Nanogenerators for Harvesting Biomechanical Energy and as Self-Powered Active Tactile Sensor System

TLDR

The TENGs may have potential applications in human‑machine interfacing, micro/nano‑electromechanical systems, and touch pad technology. We report human skin based triboelectric nanogenerators that can harvest biomechanical energy or serve as a self‑powered tactile sensor system for touch pad technology. The TENG is built by contacting human skin with a micropyramid‑structured PDMS film attached to a grounded ITO electrode, and its operation relies on charge transfer modulated by the separation distance, enabling an independently addressed matrix for touch location and pressure tracking. The fabricated TENG produces up to –1000 V open‑circuit voltage, 8 mA m⁻² short‑circuit current density, and 500 mW m⁻² power density, sufficient to drive many LEDs, and its matrix configuration delivers self‑powered, high‑resolution touch sensing with 0.29 V kPa⁻¹ sensitivity and 3 mm × 3 mm pixels.

Abstract

We report human skin based triboelectric nanogenerators (TENG) that can either harvest biomechanical energy or be utilized as a self-powered tactile sensor system for touch pad technology. We constructed a TENG utilizing the contact/separation between an area of human skin and a polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) film with a surface of micropyramid structures, which was attached to an ITO electrode that was grounded across a loading resistor. The fabricated TENG delivers an open-circuit voltage up to -1000 V, a short-circuit current density of 8 mA/m(2), and a power density of 500 mW/m(2) on a load of 100 MΩ, which can be used to directly drive tens of green light-emitting diodes. The working mechanism of the TENG is based on the charge transfer between the ITO electrode and ground via modulating the separation distance between the tribo-charged skin patch and PDMS film. Furthermore, the TENG has been used in designing an independently addressed matrix for tracking the location and pressure of human touch. The fabricated matrix has demonstrated its self-powered and high-resolution tactile sensing capabilities by recording the output voltage signals as a mapping figure, where the detection sensitivity of the pressure is about 0.29 ± 0.02 V/kPa and each pixel can have a size of 3 mm × 3 mm. The TENGs may have potential applications in human-machine interfacing, micro/nano-electromechanical systems, and touch pad technology.