RARE EARTH OXIDE DIELECTRICS FOR FLEXIBLE TRIBOELECTRIC NANOGENERATOR

Rare earth oxides (REO) are well known in catalysts, glass-related industries, and permanent magnets manufacturing for almost 70%, according to the mature industry. This work proposes the new developments of REO as the emergence for mechanical energy harvesting (MEH) technology. The binary-system of REO or R2O3, including La2O3, Sm2O3 and Nd2O3, are used as dielectric materials to incorporate polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) for fabricating flexible triboelectric nanogenerators (TENG), one of MEH devices. The change in REO’s amount was studied at 0.5, 2.5, 5, and 10 wt%. Upon applying mechanical force in vertical direction, the PDMS/R2O3 TENG can convert mechanical energy into electricity for the best value of ~66 V and ~93 µA with power density of about ~62 µW·cm-2. The PDMS/La2O3 can be used to fully charge the 0.22 and 0.33 µF capacitor within 3 seconds and power up over 100 LEDs directly. Moreover, the influence of triboelectric polarity and dielectricity on the triboelectric output performance is scientifically discussed by following the percolation point with air breakdown limitation’s theory. The researcher believes that the knowledge of this work will be inexhaustible useful to develop a group of REO in broad applications of MEH electronics in future.