Theoretical analyses of the electronic breaker switching method for nonlinear energy harvesting interfaces

It has been proved that the harvested energy can be greatly improved by applying nonlinear treatments on the piezoelectric element. These treatments consist of switching the piezoelectric element on a resonant electrical network intermittently. To implement these treatments with little power consumption, a self-powered switching circuit called electronic breaker has been researched. Although the operation of the switching control circuit has been introduced, the theoretical model of the circuit has not been set up. Therefore, the purpose of this article is to further investigate the mechanism of this circuit and to establish its theoretical model. Furthermore, this switching circuit is employed in the parallel synchronized switch harvesting on inductor interface and the synchronous charge extraction interface. It is proved that the electronic breaker can fulfill different switching times in these interfaces. It is shown both theoretically and experimentally that the parallel synchronized switch harvesting on inductor interface allows a gain of 18.4 of power compared to a standard circuit, while the synchronous charge extraction interface results in a gain of 4. Meanwhile, the switching circuits consume less than 2% power of that harvested. Thus, the electronic breaker circuit has been proved an efficient way of charging control for self-powered vibration generators.