Advanced Materials Research Group
School for Advanced Research in Polymers-ARSTPS
Central Institute of Petrochemicals Engineering & Technology (CIPET)
Former: Central Institute of Plastics Engineering & Technology (CIPET)
Chennai, India
Energy Harvesting: Nanogenerators
Energy plays a vital role in our life; any electrical gadgets need electrical power to work. The existing technology mainly depends on batteries and solar cells to portable power devices. But this also needs to be frequently replaced or to be maintained periodically. To meet the electrical needs we are developing an innovative energy harvesting system based on electrostatic and piezoelectric mechanism they are named as Triboelectric Nanogenerator and Piezoelectric Nanogenerator. These nanogenerators can harvest energy from various sources such as vibration, wind, water and biomechanical energy. The main aim of our research group is develop a complete self-powered system, which can be useful for our day to day life.
Piezoelectric NG
Triboelectric NG
Flexoelectricity
Flexoelectric effect refers to the linear coupling between electric polarization and mechanical strain gradient that exists in different categories of materials like solid materials, polymers, liquid crystals, biomembranes etc. Its a unique property of all the dielectric materials whereby they are polarized when subjected to an inhomogeneous deformation. As strain gradient breaks the inversion symmetry, flexoelectric effect can generate electric polarization due to lattice deformations in all the dielectric materials. The performance of some piezoelectric nanogenerators is enhanced due to the flexoelectric effect. Originating from the scaling effect of gradient, it exhibits micro/nano sensing applications like strain, pressure, inertial force etc. Our research group mainly focuses on flexoelectricity in different materials and the measurement methods of flexoelectric coefficients.