Wearable thermal energy harvester powered by human foot

doi:10.1007/s11708-012-0215-9

Front Energ

0, Vol.

Issue () : 26-38 https://doi.org/10.1007/s11708-012-0215-9

RESEARCH ARTICLE

Wearable thermal energy harvester powered by human foot

Guodong XU¹, Yang YANG¹, Yixin ZHOU¹, Jing LIU²(

)

1. Key Laboratory of Cryogenics and Beijing Key Laboratory of Cryo-Biomedical Engineering, Technical Institute of Physics and Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China; 2. Key Laboratory of Cryogenics and Beijing Key Laboratory of Cryo-Biomedical Engineering, Technical Institute of Physics and Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China; Department of Biomedical Engineering, School of Medicine, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China

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Abstract

With explosive applications of many advanced mobile electronic devices, a pervasive energy system with long term sustainability becomes increasingly important. Among the many efforts ever tried, human power is rather unique due to its independence of weather or geographical conditions and is therefore becoming a research focus. This paper is dedicated to demonstrate the possibility and feasibility of harvesting thermal energy from human body by sandwiching a thermoelectric generator (TEG) between human shoe bottom and ground, aiming to power a portable electronic device. Through the conceptual experiments conducted on adults, a maximum 3.99 mW steady state power output at a ground temperature with 273 K is obtained, which is sufficient enough to drive a lot of micro-electronic devices. Also, parametric simulations are performed to systematically clarify the factors influencing the TEG working performance. To further reveal the mechanism of this power generation modality, analytical solutions to the coupled temperature distributions for human foot and TEG module are obtained and the correlation between TEG characteristics and the output power are studied. It was demonstrated that, the TEG working as a wearable power resource by utilizing thermal energy of human foot shows enormous potential and practical values either under normal or extreme conditions.

Keywords human power thermal energy energy harvesting micro power wearable device

Corresponding Author(s): LIU Jing,Email:jliu@mail.ipc.ac.cn

Issue Date: 05 March 2013

Cite this article:

Guodong XU,Yang YANG,Yixin ZHOU, et al. Wearable thermal energy harvester powered by human foot[J]. Front Energ, 0, (): 26-38.

URL:

https://academic.hep.com.cn/fie/EN/10.1007/s11708-012-0215-9
https://academic.hep.com.cn/fie/EN/Y0/V/I/26

Fig.1 Sketch of conceptual experiment

Fig.2 Measurement results across the multi-stage TEG
(a) Female adult; (b) male adult: (I) transient temperature and temperature difference across the multi-stage TEG, (II) the measured output voltage and maximum power of the multi-stage TEG

Fig.3 Measurement results at different ground temperatures

Fig.4 Sketch of the 3D calculation domain of size 0.054 m × 0.054 m ×0.099 m

Tab.1 Typical parameters for all the materials adopted in the calculation [-]

Tab.2 The temperature difference, open voltage and maximum output power by simulation and experiments

Fig.5 Thermal state of the calculation domain and generation of the electricity
(a) Steady state temperature contour of the middle Z-cross section; (b) static temperature curve along direction ; (c) temperature differences across the two junctions of the multi-stage TEG, the steady state open voltage and the output power of the TEG

Fig.6 Steady-state temperature difference between the two junctions of the TEG and open voltage of the TEG when = 263 K, 273 K, 283 K, 293 K, 303 K, 313 K, 323 K and 333 K, respectively and steady-state maximum output power with above-mentioned various ground temperatures

Fig.7 Steady-state temperature difference between the two junctions of the TEG, open voltage and steady-state output power in different blood perfusions and metabolic heat generation rates

Fig.8 Steady-state temperature difference between the two junctions of the TEG, open voltage of the TEG and steady-state output power with different thicknesses of the thermal contact resistance

Fig.9 Sketch of two different patterns of the TEG and the calculated output results
(a) Sketch of two different patterns of the TEG; (b) steady-state temperature difference between the two junctions of the TEG, open voltage and output power of the TEG with different patterns of the TEG

Fig.10 Steady-state temperature difference between the two junctions of the TEG and open voltage of the TEG when = 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, and 16 mm, respectively and steady-state maximum output power with above-mentioned various thicknesses of the TEG

Fig.11 Steady-state temperature difference between the two junctions of the TEG and open voltage of the TEG and steady-state output power with different numbers of the TEG

Fig.12 Simplified two-layer human foot tissues with the rubber of sole and the TEG which include the thermopiles and ceramic insulation films along the dimension

Fig.13 Analytical solution for skin temperature and output power of the TEG
(a) Different ground temperature; (b) various thicknesses of TEG

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