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posted by janrinok on Tuesday December 13 2016, @08:13PM   Printer-friendly
from the stepping-up-the-power dept.

Touchscreens have become a ubiquitous feature of modern life for people around the world. Millions of smartphones have been poked, prodded, and swiped, running down batteries constantly.

But researchers at Michigan State University have created a new kind of electric generator that could one day store the energy from touching and swiping a smartphone that may one day be used to help charge smartphones using nothing but day-to-day human motion.

The device is known as a biocompatible ferroelectret nanogenerator, or FENG. Using relatively low-cost and environmentally-friendly materials, FENG converts the energy from touching or pressing it into electricity. While similar devices powered by motion already exist, this one is thin, foldable, and relatively cheap to produce, creating a means of generating electricity that could use the energy from touch to power smartphone screens in the near future.


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 13 2016, @08:57PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 13 2016, @08:57PM (#441003)

    Energy = Force * Distance

    Typical key press on a phone do not require (aka cannot produce) much energy. To increase it to a meaningful amount would require either more force or distance (or a combination of the two). I expect to use this from my solar powered car (hint: 40% panel efficiency * 1kW/m2 = 0.5 hp per m2 of panels).

  • (Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 13 2016, @09:09PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 13 2016, @09:09PM (#441009)

    You underestimate how forcefully girls swipe left when they see your face.

  • (Score: 2) by arslan on Tuesday December 13 2016, @09:57PM

    by arslan (3462) on Tuesday December 13 2016, @09:57PM (#441028)

    Umm... is that really the equation for Energy or is it Work? Also, they mention converting mechanical energy which would indicate it that it includes potential and kinetic energy..

  • (Score: 1) by anubi on Wednesday December 14 2016, @09:16AM

    by anubi (2828) on Wednesday December 14 2016, @09:16AM (#441211) Journal

    My first impression is to get some massive part of the machine ( like the battery ) mechanically isolated in such a manner as to harness the energy of the device being moved... you know, the Force=Mass*Acceleration thing, recovering the energy - just like you said : Force*Distance. Using similar paradigms as used by those mechanical self-winding watches that ran as long as the wearer at least kept moving the thing.

    While it may recover *some* energy from you as you tote the thing along with you, I would imagine most of its energy would be recovered while traveling with you on motorized transport. I get jostled a lot in my van or on public transport - especially so if the road isn't pristine. Truck and taxi drivers are well aware of how much vibrational energy they absorb on the job - so much so it messes up their kidneys.

    Use principles like the "shake light", but there is a lot of work to be done to improve conversion efficiency of that device. I believe its do-able with modern neodymium magnetics and voice-coil assemblies, combined with appropriate micro DC/DC converters.

    Please don't tell me this is unworkable because such a device rattles. If it rattles, you did not convert the mechanical energy to electrical. It should be about as dead mechanically as if you had mounted the battery pack in a very viscous fluid that did nothing but heat up as you shook the hell out of it.

    I believe that mounting the battery pack in a such a shock-absorber/generator suspension has the best chance of mechanizing a workable self-charging device.

    --
    "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
    • (Score: 2) by Nuke on Wednesday December 14 2016, @10:29AM

      by Nuke (3162) on Wednesday December 14 2016, @10:29AM (#441225)

      My first impression is to get some massive part of the machine ...isolated in such a manner as to harness the energy of the device being moved.

      You mean like self-winding watches, invented around 1773 [wikipedia.org]. My great-uncle had one (not in 1773, around 1960) and said that driving a car was good for winding it. These were mechanical watches of course, but easy to put in a piezoelectric generator. Is someone claiming to be a genius about this?

      • (Score: 1) by anubi on Wednesday December 14 2016, @12:12PM

        by anubi (2828) on Wednesday December 14 2016, @12:12PM (#441241) Journal

        Yep, I was thinking along the lines of what powered the self-winding watch when I posted that. I like the idea, only now I want to draw off the energy as electrical instead of mechanical, so some sort of energy conversion technology will be called for.

        Electromagnetic is the first that came to mind. I was not too hot on piezo as I am not familiar enough around those when I talk low voltages and high currents. If you talk high voltage and low currents, then I am all piezo.

        I am quite impressed over the lowly dollar-store piezo barbeque lighters. Those things can be hacked into quite a few useful things.

        --
        "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]