SoylentNews

Phoenix666 writes:

A recent study, led by Professor Kyoung Jin Choi in the School of Materials Science and Engineering at UNIST has introduced a new advanced energy harvesting system, capable of generating electricity by simply being attached to clothes, windows, and outer walls of a building.

This new device is based on a temperature difference between the hot and cold sides. The temperature difference can be increased as high as 20.9 °C, which is much higher than the typical temperature differences of 1.5 to 4.1 °C of wearable thermoelectric generators driven by body heat. The research team expects that their wearable solar thermoelectric generator proposes a promising way to further improve the efficiency by raising the temperature difference.

[...] The research team solved this low temperature difference faced by conventional wearable TEGs by introducing a local solar absorber on a PI substrate. The solar absorber is a five-period Ti/MgF₂ superlattice, in which the structure and thickness of each layer was designed for optimal absorption of sunlight. This has increased the temperature difference as high as 20.9 °C, which is the highest value of all wearable TEGs reported to date.

It will be sad when iPhone users don't camp out around outlets anymore.

Yeon Soo Jung, Dea Han Jeong, Sung Bum Kang, Fredrick Kim, Myeong Hoon Jeong, Ki-Suk Lee, Jae Sung Son, Jeong Min Baik, Jin-Sang Kim, Kyoung Jin Choi. Wearable solar thermoelectric generator driven by unprecedentedly high temperature difference. Nano Energy, 2017; DOI: 10.1016/j.nanoen.2017.08.061

Original Submission