Fabrication of flexible self-powered humidity sensor based on super-hydrophilic titanium oxide nanotube arrays

Stable and flexible super-hydrophilic nanotubular-based titanium oxide electrode has been utilized as the active electrode of self-powered humidity sensor. TiO2 nanotubular electrodes fabricated through anodization method and utilized in combination with Kapton electrode as the triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG). Vertical contact-separation mode TENG performance has been examined in various range of frequencies and the maximum output voltage and current more than 300 V and 40 mu A respectively with maximum power of 1.25 +/- 0.67 mW has been achieved at 4 Hz. The fabricated TENG has been employed as the active self-powered humidity sensor. Super-hydrophilic feature of TiO2 nanotubes resulted in full absorption of water molecules, and noticeable decrease in charge transfer across two triboelectric materials upon increasing humidity. The TiO2-based TENG sensor was exposed to various relative humidity (RH) and the results showed that by increasing the humidity the output voltage and output current decreased from 162.24 +/- 35.99 V and 20.4 +/- 4.93 mu A at RH=20% to 37.92 +/- 1.54 V at RH=79% and 40.87 88 6.88 +/- 1.7 mu A at RH=84%, respectively, Which shows the responsivity more than 300%. This method of measuring humidity has a simple and cost-effective fabrication that has various applications in many fields such as industry and medicine.