Versatile Core–Sheath Yarn for Sustainable Biomechanical Energy Harvesting and Real‐Time Human‐Interactive Sensing

Abstract

The emergence of stretchable textile‐based mechanical energy harvester and self‐powered active sensor brings a new life for wearable functional electronics. However, single energy conversion mode and weak sensing capabilities have largely hindered their development. Here, in virtue of silver‐coated nylon yarn and silicone rubber elastomer, a highly stretchable yarn‐based triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) with coaxial core–sheath and built‐in spring‐like spiral winding structures is designed for biomechanical energy harvesting and real‐time human‐interactive sensing. Based on the two advanced structural designs, the yarn‐based TENG can effectively harvest or respond rapidly to omnifarious external mechanical stimuli, such as compressing, stretching, bending, and twisting. With these excellent performances, the yarn‐based TENG can be used in a self‐counting skipping rope, a self‐powered gesture‐recognizing glove, and a real‐time golf scoring system. Furthermore, the yarn‐based TENG can also be woven into a large‐area energy‐harvesting fabric, which is capable of lighting up light emitting diodes (LEDs), charging a commercial capacitor, powering a smart watch, and integrating the four operational modes of TENGs together. This work provides a new direction for textile‐based multimode mechanical energy harvesters and highly sensitive self‐powered motion sensors with potential applications in sustainable power supplies, self‐powered wearable electronics, personalized motion/health monitoring, and real‐time human‐machine interactions.

Human–Machine Interfacing Enabled by Triboelectric Nanogenerators and Tribotronics

“…Nevertheless, to further realize HMI applications, the structures of TENGs have to be specifically and carefully designed to capture the body motion. In this regard, tremendous researches have been carried out and many kinds of human body motions can be detected effectively, including the eye ball motion, the eye blink, the gesture change, the posture change, and so on. Due to the limited space, we will mainly introduce two typical applications here, which are the smart glass for hands‐free control and typing, and the smart textile for gesture and posture detection …”

“…g) The yarn‐based TENG posture detection and its application in a real‐time golf scoring system. Reproduced with permission . Copyright 2018, John Wiley and Sons.…”

“…The TENG enabled smart textiles have provided the possibility of sensing the human motion while harvesting the mechanical energy as well . To this end, Dong et al designed a highly stretchable yarn‐based TENG for both kinetic energy harvesting and body motion detection . The spring‐like spiral winding structure of the proposed yarn‐based TENG is illustrated in Figure e, which consists of the outer sheath tube and the inner core column as the two main parts.…”

“…Among the various approaches toward this goal of HMIs, the triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) and tribotronics have emerged as promising alternatives in recent years. The TENG, based on the coupling of contact electrification and electrostatic induction, was invented by Wang and co‐workers .…”

Investigating the wicking behavior of micro/nanofibrous core‐sheath PET–PAN yarn modified by dimethyl 5‐sodium sulfoisophthalate

“…21 Recently, many applications have been reported for the core-sheath yarns. According to the previous research studies, some applications include functional sutures, 22,23 wearable piezoelectric nanogenerators, 24 heat storage systems, 25 energy harvesting devices, 26 supercapacitors, 6,27 and tissue engineering scaffolds. 9 Zhao et al investigated the application of the core-sheath yarns in the woven filters.…”