Modelling and Analysis of Ionic Polymer Metal Composite based Energy Harvester

Ionic Polymer Metal Composites (IPMC) are smart materials which are used as sensor and actuators. A cantilever IPMC beam is considered as energy harvester in the fluid environment. An estimation of the power harvested by the cantilever IPMC beam from the base excitation is obtained using a mathematical model. Furthermore, an energy harvester consisting of several IPMC layers is considered for the improvement of the harvesting capabilities. The multilayer IPMC harvester is designed with series and parallel stacking. A significant improvement is found in the power harvested by considering the multilayer IPMC harvester with series stacking. The Power harvested in fluid environment can be used for the application of MEMS devices which requires low power in the range of microwatt to nanowatt.