Stretchable Triboelectric Textile Composed of Wavy Conductive-Cloth PET and Patterned Stretchable Electrode for Harvesting Multivariant Human Motion Energy

Triboelectric textile with wearable property and feasibility of large area preparation has presented a great prospect in effectively collecting energy from human body motion to provide power supply for diversified wearable electronics. Here, we report a stretchable triboelectric textile (STET) composed of wavy conductive-cloth poly­(ethylene terephthalate) and a patterned stretchable electrode as basic knitting units, which can achieve multivariant energy harvest with low cost and good comfort. STET displays excellent output performances due to diversified working principles of contact-separation and contact-sliding modes. Interaction between the knitting units can generate open-circuit voltage with a peak-to-peak value of 350 V and instantaneous peak power of 1 mW; the stretched-released STET produces a peak voltage of 32 V, whereas tapping the STET with cotton twice gives contact-separation movements generating improved peak voltage and current. To prove the potential application, the STET is fixed onto different positions of a human body to effectively harvest multivariant human body motion energy. Therefore, this work provides a new approach applying stretchable triboelectric textile for power supply in wearable devices.