Dresden 2014 – scientific programme

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DS: Fachverband Dünne Schichten

DS 43: Poster II: Organic thin films; Atomic layer deposition, Thin film characterization: Structure analysis and composition (XRD, TEM, XPS, SIMS, RBS, ...)

DS 43.17: Poster

Thursday, April 3, 2014, 16:00–19:00, P1

A comparison of dielectric elastomers and electrostrictive polymers for vibration energy harvesting applications — •Kirstin Bornhorst, Christian Schirrmann, Andreas Weder, Andreas Heinig, and Florenta Costache — Fraunhofer Institute for Photonic Microsystems IPMS, Dresden, Germany

Harvesting energy from the surrounding environment and converting it into usable electrical energy has become an attractive approach to producing sustainable power sources for wireless sensors and low-power electronics.

In this paper, electroactive polymers (dielectric elastomers and electrostrictive polymers) are compared in terms of their potential for vibration energy harvesting applications. Stacks consisting of polymer thin films placed in between thin metallic electrodes were subjected to dynamic deformation by means of a pneumatic piston of variable frequency and pressure characteristics. A self-priming energy harvesting circuit was developed and used to harvest the generated energy. We investigated the polymer harvester performance, i.e. energy gained from the capacity change, when employing electroactive polymers of different elastic moduli, dielectric constants or electrostrictive constants. Furthermore, we studied the influence of the stack geometry. It is shown that for instance by using a polymer with high electromechanical coupling a harvested energy density of about 0.2 mJ/cm³ at 15 Hz could be obtained. The harvested energy could be further increased by increasing the frequency of the induced deformation. Applications such as power generation for wireless sensors will be addressed.