Piezoelectric wind energy harvesting device based on the inverted cantilever beam with leaf-inspired extensions

作者：Maoying Zhou, Qinzhong Chen, Zhenlong Xu, Wen Wang · 发表于：AIP Advances · 年份：2019 · DOI：10.1063/1.5082811 · 被引用次数：24 · 研究领域：Innovative Energy Harvesting Technologies、Energy Harvesting in Wireless Networks、Advanced Sensor and Energy Harvesting Materials

Inspired by the fluttering of leaves in wind, we propose a novel type of wind energy harvesting device composed of a piezoelectric bimorph beam and flexible extensions. Working principle and advantages of the proposed design are discussed with numerical simulations conducted to investigate the influence of extension shape upon the device performance. Fabricated prototypes are tested in a simple experiment setup to give a description of the actual device performance. Results show that the leaf-inspired sector-shaped flexible extension corresponds to a better device performance. The test for the dual attachment case of the flexible extensions shows unexpected results, showing that the interaction and collision between the two flexible extensions are to be further explored and optimized.