Smart phone-enabled monitoring of acoustic energy harvesting for low power charging services / Nurliza Salim

This study investigates the capability of Acoustic Energy Harvesters (AEH) in generating electricity to minimize electricity consumption. In AEHs, piezoelectric materials convert mechanical stress into electrical energy. It generates electricity with the application of stimulus such as pressure or sound. This thesis reports on the study of a commercial passive piezoelectric transducer effect on an energy harvesting circuit. Based on previous studies, the acoustic energy generated have been mostly used to power up high power devices, such as streetlights and low power devices, such as Wireless Sensor Nodes (WSN)s. Little is known on battery charging services employed using this source of harvested energy. Capitalizing on this potential, AEH could be used in low power charging applications such as mobile electronic gadgets. The methodology employed in this study is via the energy harvesting circuit based on Piezoelectric Acoustic Energy Harvester (PEAEH) technique. The resultant voltage produced by the PEAEH circuit is 3.53 Volts and is adequate to be used as a battery charger. The battery charging data are consequently fed into the monitoring serial monitor display and transmitted wirelessly via Wi-Fi. Finally, the study advocates the use of a smart phone application to monitor the remaining battery charging capacity with a notification function.