Effects of metal nanoparticles on the performance of PDMS based triboelectric nanogenerators

Energy harnessing gadgets which employ triboelectric effect have garnered global attention due to excellent output performance compared to other nanogenerators for various applications. In this article, an attempt has been made to modify the properties of poly dimethyl siloxane (PDMS), which is a tribo material by embedding it with metal nanoparticles of different conductivity and in different weight percent. TENGs based on metal nanoparticle/PDMS composite films are fabricated and electrical characteristics were examined. This study reveals that the filler with best conductivity exhibits excellent properties. Presence of silver nanoparticles increased the permittivity of the tribolayer from 5.3 to 16.9 for 20 wt% filler at 1 kHz. Electrical studies of silver/PDMS composite film gave appreciable results; 5.1 mu A (Isc), 33.6 V (Voc), 72.2 mu W power at 8 M omega with 10 N force at an excitation frequency of 10 Hz.