A comparative analysis of different vibration based energy harvesting techniques for implantables

Abstract

Energy harvesting is the process of scavenging electrical energy from energy sources available in the environment. A wide variety of energy sources can be exploited here. Some of the sources include kinetic energy, thermal energy, solar energy etc. With the progress in low power design, the concept of harvesting energy to power electronic circuits has also gained relevance. Electrical energy/power can be harvested by exploiting the human body motion. Different types of transducers can be used for this. Piezoelectric materials, variable capacitors, and inductive generators can be employed here according to the type of harvester. An important and vast area of application of energy harvesting can be the medical implants field. Energy harvesting for the powering of a new generation of medical implants, miniaturized implants (functioning without battery) such as a pacemaker is discussed. Various potential techniques for this energy transduction are studied, surveyed and compared. Also the different types of mechanical energy sources in the implant environment are explored.

Self-Sustainability of Energy Harvesting Systems: Concept, Analysis, and Design

“…where ξ n = n i=1 σ i . The pairs (σ i , H i ) are mutually independent and have the same common distribution given in (10).…”

“…vibrations [8], [10], ambient radio-frequency (RF) radiation [11], [12], bodily motions [13], magnetic field [14], ambient sound [15], and ambient light [16], [17]. Such energy harvesting techniques have been applied in the context of various technologies such as wireless sensor networks [18]- [21], telecommunications [22]- [25], cellular networks [26], cognitive radio network [27]- [29], vehicular network [30], health care [31], [32], IoT (Internet of things) [33], [34], IoE (Internet of energy) [35], and smart grid [36]- [38] technology.…”

Modelling of silicon based electrostatic energy harvester for cardiac implants

“…This idea of harvesting electrical energy from the body vibrations such as heartbeats, is gaining commendable interdisciplinary research interest. An analysis and comparison of three different types of vibration energy harvesting techniques: Electrostatic; Piezoelectric and, Electromagnetic Energy Harvesting for pacemakers has been presented in [3]. It can be concluded from the survey that Electrostatic based Transduction method of energy harvesting is most suitable for cardiac implants.…”

Energy Harvesting: A Toxic Free and Reliable Power Source for Implantable Microsystems

“…Hence an alternate energy source is required to continuously power these implants. One such approach which can address the abovementioned problem is Energy Harvesting [14,15]. It is the process of scavenging out energy from different sources in the ambient environment.…”