Structural vibration energy harvesting using piezoelectric materials

Abstract

Over the past two decades the field of smart materials has been playing a key role in the solution of many engineering problems. The diversity of interesting properties exhibited by these materials when subjected to external stimuli (electric potential, mechanical loads, internal damage, or temperature gradients) originated the term smart even though designations such as adaptive, intelligent, active, adptronics, and even structronics are also encountered in the current literature. Materials showing this "smartness" property include but are not limited to piezoelectric, magnetostrictive, electrostrictive as well as magnetorheological fluids and shape memory alloys. Important applications can be easily found for smart materials in different fields such as passive and active control of noise and vibration, aeroelasticity, damping treatments, etc. Most of the early development concerning the use of these materials was driven by the need of novel and more efficient solutions for the aerospace industry (e.g. vibration control of large and very flexible structures). More recently a broad range of new applications for smart materials has been envisaged to civil and automotive structures as well as medical applications, among others. In the past six years substantial research involving the use of piezoceramic materials has been dedicated to the issue of converting ambient energy to power small electronic equipment, commonly referred to as energy harvesting or energy scavenging. Major interests in designing energy harvesters rely on developing portable self-powered devices that do not require battery replacement and most importantly that may function over extended periods of time. The major goal of this proposal is to study and propose novel energy harvesting configurations for beam type structures using piezoelectric materials. (AU)