Electrospun poly(vinylidene fluoride)-zinc oxide hierarchical composite fiber membrane as piezoelectric acoustoelectric nanogenerator

Nanogenerators which efficiently convert mechanical forces, vibrations and sound to electrical energy have attracted much attention and showed potential application as sustainable energy source for powering miniature devices. In this work, we fabricated a piezoelectric acoustoelectric nanogenerator using poly(vinylidene fluoride)-zinc oxide composite fiber membrane with hierarchical microstructure by electrospinning and hydrothermal techniques. The prepared PVDF–ZnO acoustoelectric nanogenerator (PVDF–ZnOANG) was able to generate voltage and current output of 1.12 V and 1.6 μA with a power density output of 0.2 μW cm−2 (50 μW cm−3) in optimized sound condition (140 Hz, 116 dB). Under the optimized sound condition, the electric energy generated by the prepared PVDF–ZnOANG could charge a capacitor up to 1.3 V in 3 min. The PVDF–ZnOANG generated higher voltage output under sound of low frequency and high sound pressure level and therefore might be a promising power source for noise energy harvesting.