- A new material that generates electricity has been made by scientists
- The material was synthesized at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
- It could be used in shoes, keyboard, and building to generate electricity
Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) in New York have made a significant breakthrough in sustainable energy, paving the way for futuristic innovations like self-charging cars, energy-generating skyscrapers, and streetlights powered by traffic.
The research team developed a new environmentally friendly material which taps into the power of the piezoelectric effect. This phenomenon causes materials to generate electricity when subjected to pressure or vibrations.
The new polymer film, infused with a chalcogenide perovskite compound, has promising applications in a wide variety of fields, from infrastructure to biomedical devices.
Chalcogenide perovskite film
The piezoelectric effect occurs when certain materials, lacking structural symmetry, produce electric charges under mechanical stress. As the material is compressed or stretched, positive and negative ions within it are separated, creating what is known as a dipole moment. This moment can then be harvested as electrical energy.
For decades, engineers and scientists have sought ways to exploit this phenomenon, but many existing piezoelectric materials contain lead, limiting their environmental friendliness.
The new polymer film developed by RPI researchers is lead-free making it a more appealing option for green energy solutions. The film’s key ingredient is a chalcogenide perovskite compound that contains barium, zirconium, and sulfur. After the research team synthesized this compound, they tested its ability to generate electricity through various human movements such as walking, running, clapping, and tapping.
According to the research, the material generated enough electricity in these tests to power a bank of LED lights. The new film is 0.3 millimeters thick thus it could be easily integrated into devices and structures without significantly altering their designs. This film could therefore be integrated into the keyboard of our laptops to charge the device as we type.
Other use cases posited include incorporating the material into shoes to charge devices as people walk, integrated into electric car tires to charge the battery as the car moves, or integrated into building structures to generate power as they sway in the wind or shift with daily use.
“We are excited and encouraged by our findings and their potential to support the transition to green energy,” said Nikhil Koratkar, Ph.D., corresponding author of the study and the John A. Clark and Edward T. Crossan Professor in the Department of Mechanical, Aerospace, and Nuclear Engineering.
“Lead is toxic and increasingly being restricted and phased out of materials and devices. Our goal was to create a material that was lead-free and could be made inexpensively using elements commonly found in nature…Essentially, the material converts mechanical energy into electrical energy—the greater the applied pressure load and the greater the surface area over which the pressure is applied, the greater the effect,” Koratkar added
Via TechXplore
