Enhanced mechanical energy conversion with selectively decayed wood.

Area of Science:

• Materials Science
• Renewable Energy
• Biotechnology

Background:

• Meeting energy demands and climate change mitigation requires renewable electricity generation and reduced building energy consumption.
• Wood, a sustainable building material, possesses piezoelectric properties enabling mechanical energy to electrical energy conversion.
• The piezoelectric output of native wood is too low for practical energy harvesting applications.

Purpose of the Study:

• To enhance the piezoelectric output of balsa wood for potential energy generation.
• To investigate a green and sustainable method for improving wood's piezoelectric performance.
• To develop novel self-powered green building materials.

Main Methods:

• Balsa wood was pretreated using a facile, green, and sustainable fungal decay process to enhance its elastic compressibility.
• The piezoelectric output of the pretreated wood was measured under applied mechanical stress.
• Characterization of the enhanced piezoelectric properties of the decayed wood was performed.

Main Results:

• Fungal decay pretreatment increased the piezoelectric output of balsa wood by over 55 times.
• A small cube of decayed wood (15 mm x 15 mm x 13.2 mm) generated a maximum voltage of 0.87 V and a current of 13.3 nA under 45-kPa stress.
• The enhanced elastic compressibility directly correlated with the increased piezoelectric performance.

Conclusions:

• Fungal decay is an effective strategy to significantly enhance the piezoelectric properties of wood.
• This research presents a fundamental step towards developing next-generation self-powered green building materials.
• The findings contribute to sustainable energy solutions and climate change mitigation through innovative material applications.