Tribo-Mechanical Investigation of the Functional Components used in Flexible Energy Harvesting Devices

Abstract

During the previous decade, the development of energy harvesting devices based on piezoelectric materials has garnered great interest. The ability to capture ambient mechanical energy and convert it to useable electricity is a potential solution to the ever-growing energy crisis. One of the most attractive functional materials used in these devices is zinc oxide (ZnO). This material's relative low cost and ease of large-area processing has spurred numerous device designs based around it. The ability to grow ZnO nanostructures of various geometries with lowtemperature chemical methods makes this material even more attractive for flexible devices. Although numerous device architectures have been developed, the long-term mechanical reliability has not been addressed. This work focuses on the fabrication and mechanical failure analysis of the flexible components typically used in piezoelectric energy harvesting devices. A three-phase iterative design process was used to fabricate prototypical piezoelectric nanogenerators, based on ZnO nanowires. An output of several millivolts was achieved under normal contact and microtensile loading, but device failure occurred after only a few loading cycles, in all cases. Ex situ failure analysis confirmed the primary sources of failure, which became the focus of further, component-level studies. Failure was primarily seen in the flexible electrodes of the nanogenerating devices, but was also observed in the functional piezoelectric layer itself.