This burgeoning hypernetwork is projected to reach trillions of gadgets by next decade, improving the number of sensing unit nodes deployed in its platforms.
Present approaches used to power sensing unit nodes depend on battery technology, but batteries need routine replacement, which is environmentally damaging and expensive in time. Also, the existing global production of lithium for battery materials may not keep up with the increasing energy demand from the swelling variety of sensing units.
Wirelessly powered sensor nodes might help accomplish a sustainable IoT by drawing energy from the environment utilizing so-called energy harvesters, such as solar batteries and radio-frequency (RF) energy harvesters, to name a few innovations. Large-area electronic devices might be crucial in making it possible for these power sources.
KAUST alumni Kalaivanan Loganathan, with Thomas Anthopoulos and colleagues, evaluated the practicality of different large-area electronic innovations and their potential to provide ecofriendly, wirelessly powered IoT sensing units.
Large-area electronics have actually recently become an attractive alternative to traditional silicon-based technologies thanks to significant progress in solution-based processing, which has actually made circuits and gadgets much easier to print on versatile, large-area substrates. They can be produced at low temperature levels and on biodegradable substrates such as paper, which makes them more ecofriendly than their silicon-based counterparts.
Over the years, Anthopoulos group has established a series of RF electronic parts, consisting of metal-oxide and organic polymer-based semiconductor devices known as Schottky diodes. “These devices are vital components in wireless energy harvesters and ultimately determine the efficiency and cost of the sensing unit nodes,” Loganathan says.
Secret contributions from the KAUST team consist of scalable techniques for producing RF diodes to collect energy reaching the 5G/6G frequency variety. “Such innovations offer the required foundation towards a more sustainable method to power the billions of sensing unit nodes in the future,” Anthopoulos states.
The team is investigating the monolithic combination of these low-power gadgets with antenna and sensing units to showcase their true capacity, Loganathan adds.
Reference: “Wirelessly powered large-area electronics for the Internet of Things” by Luis Portilla, Kalaivanan Loganathan, Hendrik Faber, Aline Eid, Jimmy G. D. Hester, Manos M. Tentzeris, Marco Fattori, Eugenio Cantatore, Chen Jiang, Arokia Nathan, Gianluca Fiori, Taofeeq Ibn-Mohammed, Thomas D. Anthopoulos and Vincenzo Pecunia, 28 December 2022, Nature Electronics.DOI: 10.1038/ s41928-022-00898-5.
Wirelessly powered electronic devices developed by KAUST researchers might assist to make web of things technology more eco-friendly. Credit: © 2022 KAUST; Heno Hwang
Wirelessly powered large-area electronics could enable a cheaper and greener web of things.
Emerging types of thin-film device innovations that count on alternative semiconductor products, such as organics, nanocarbon allotropes, and metal oxides, could contribute to a more economically and environmentally sustainable internet of things (IoT), a KAUST-led international team suggests.
The IoT is set to have a major impact on every day life and many industries. It connects and facilitates information exchange between a plethora of clever objects of various sizes and shape– such as remote-controlled home security systems, self-driving cars geared up with sensing units that detect obstacles on the road, and temperature-controlled factory equipment– online and other picking up and communications networks.
