Effect of Ag nanoparticle size on triboelectric nanogenerator for mechanical energy harvesting

Triboelectric nanogenerators (TENG) are generally utilized on the grounds that they can catch low-recurrence mechanical energy from various types of movement and convert it into electricity. It has been proved that the adulteration of conductive particles in the triboelectric layer can improve its output performance, but metal nanomaterials have different properties at different scales. In this paper, the triboelectric layer of TENG is a composite film made of silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) with different particle sizes (20 nm, 50 nm, 200 nm and 500 nm) that were dispersed and mixed with two-component liquid silica gel step by step. The open circuit voltage (Voc) and short circuit current (Isc) of the 20 nm component of the AgNPs-dispersed/two-component liquid silica gel TENG(At-TENG) are 102.8 V and 4.42μA, which are higher than the result execution of the other components. Smaller size nanoparticles have more number of nanoparticles when the mass fraction is the same. AgNPs form micro-capacitance structures in the insulating polymer layer and enhance the dielectric properties of the composite films through an interfacial polarization mechanism. At-TENG can light up 53 commercial LEDs and power calculators or wristband electronic watches, proving its utility as a self-powered power source. An extensive experiment proves the advantage of small size using comparison and theoretical analysis and provides suggestions for the selection of TENG dopants.