Dual-scale polyimide dot clampers for durable fiber-based triboelectric nanogenerators

Durability limits electrospun fiber-based triboelectric nanogenerators (TENGs) due to mechanical wear and junction instability during repeated contact. We introduce an electrospinning-only surface modification—polyimide (PI) dot clampers—on Nylon fibers, designed to enhance contact-relevant surface topology while stabilizing fiber junctions. A brief secondary electrospinning pass deposits dual-scale features: microspheres decorating individual filaments and larger dots (≤ 50 µm) that bridge neighboring filaments to pin crossings. Spectroscopy confirms imidized PI as-spun, while finite-element simulations show non-coalesced features intensify near-surface fields and broaden high-potential footprints to enhance charge transfer without sacrificing texture. Using a PVDF/PMMA/MoS 2 counterface, the optimized TENG yields 937 V, 236 nC, and 10.3 µA, a 30–50% improvement over pristine Nylon. The devices maintain waveform stationarity over 200,000 cycles, survive tape-peel challenges, and exhibit a power maximum near load-matching conditions. Human gesture demonstrations produce clean, class-separable signals, supporting the practical utility of the PI-clamping strategy for mitigating durability limitations in high-performance fibrous TENGs and wearable-interfacing applications.