Engineered and Laser-Processed Chitosan Biopolymers for Sustainable and Biodegradable Triboelectric Power Generation

Ruoxing Wang; Shengjie Gao; Zhen Yang; Yule Li; Weinong Chen; Benxin Wu; Wenzhuo Wu

doi:10.1002/adma.201706267

Engineered and Laser-Processed Chitosan Biopolymers for Sustainable and Biodegradable Triboelectric Power Generation

Adv Mater. 2018 Mar;30(11). doi: 10.1002/adma.201706267. Epub 2018 Jan 19.

Authors

Ruoxing Wang¹, Shengjie Gao¹, Zhen Yang², Yule Li³, Weinong Chen^{3

4}, Benxin Wu², Wenzhuo Wu^{1

5}

Affiliations

¹ School of Industrial Engineering, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, 47097, USA.
² School of Mechanical Engineering, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, 47907, USA.
³ School of Aeronautics and Astronautics Engineering, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, 47907, USA.
⁴ School of Materials Engineering, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, 47907, USA.
⁵ Birck Nanotechnology Center, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, 47907, USA.

PMID: 29349877
DOI: 10.1002/adma.201706267

Abstract

Recent advances achieved in triboelectric nanogenerators (TENG) focus on boosting power generation and conversion efficiency. Nevertheless, obstacles concerning economical and biocompatible utilization of TENGs continue to prevail. Being an abundant natural biopolymer from marine crustacean shells, chitosan enables exciting opportunities for low-cost, biodegradable TENG applications in related fields. Here, the development of biodegradable and flexible TENGs based on chitosan is presented for the first time. The physical and chemical properties of the chitosan nanocomposites are systematically studied and engineered for optimized triboelectric power generation, transforming the otherwise wasted natural materials into functional energy devices. The feasibility of laser processing of constituent materials is further explored for the first time for engineering the TENG performance. The laser treatment of biopolymer films offers a potentially promising scheme for surface engineering in polymer-based TENGs. The chitosan-based TENGs present efficient energy conversion performance and tunable biodegradation rate. Such a new class of TENGs derived from natural biomaterials may pave the way toward the economically viable and ecologically friendly production of flexible TENGs for self-powered nanosystems in biomedical and environmental applications.

Keywords: abundant biopolymers; biodegradable; laser treatment; triboelectric nanogenerators.