A Piezoelectric-triboelectric Heel Charger for Power-on-the-go

Background:

Running out of battery power often results in life-threatening situations, whereas backup batteries are large, heavy and hazardous. In efforts to treat this unreliable aspect, proposed is an energy harvester. This is a clean alternative solution to such problems, with the ability to power electronics on the go.

Technology Overview:

This invention entails a high power density heel charger, providing a USB port or datable rechargeable battery. The high-power density charger consists of a mechanical part and an electrical part. Current implementations consist of a heel charger that turns the shoe into a charging station. This uses a levered piezoelectric-triboelectric multimodal mechanism, a mechanical synchronized switch and a harvesting inductor conditioning circuit. The shoe has barely noticeable weight, expecting to provide electrical energy equivalent to 6 minutes of continuous phone call with just 1 hour of walking.

Advantages:

Amplifying the displacement of footsteps by the lever mechanism to achieve higher efficiency.

Applications:

The ability to target large markets such as mobile energy harvesting, remote sensing, hikers and marine corps, etc.

Intellectual Property Summary:

Patent Application Published: US-2020-0177105-A1

Stage of Development:

Working prototype available for demonstration.

Licensing Status:

 

Licensing Potential:

Development partner - Commercial partner - Licensing

Additional Information: