A quantitative investigation of inertial power harvesting for human-powered devices

ABSTRACT

We present an empirical study of the long-term practicality of using human motion to generate operating power for body-mounted consumer electronics and health sensors. We have collected a large continuous acceleration dataset from eight experimental subjects going about their normal daily routine for 3 days each. Each subject is instrumented with a data collection apparatus that simultaneously logs 3-axis, 80Hz acceleration data from six body locations. We use this dataset to optimize a first-principles physical model of the commonly used velocity damped resonant generator (VDRG) by selecting physical parameters such as resonant frequency and damping coefficient to maximize harvested power. Our results show that with reasonable assumptions on size, mass, placement, and efficiency of VDRG harvesters, most body-mounted wireless sensors and even some consumer electronics devices, may be powered continuously and indefinitely from everyday motion.

REFERENCES

• 1: ADXL330 3-axis accelerometer, http://www.analog.com/en/prod/0,2877,ADXL330,00.html.
• 2: ASK single conversion receiver TDA 5200, http://www.infineon.com/dgdl/TDA5200_V2+9.pdf?folderId=db3a304412b407950112b408e8c90004&fileId=db3a304412b407950112b411c7db176e.
• 3: FM20 low-voltage analog temp sensor, http://www.fairchildsemi.com/pf/FM/FM20.html.
• 4: HIH-3610 series, http://content.honeywell.com/sensing/prodinfo/humiditymoisture/009012_2.pdf.
• 5: PMG μ-generator, http://www.perpetuum.co.uk/.
• 6: VEH-360 electromechanical generator, http://www.ferrosi.com/energy-harvesters.html.
• 7: Seiko AGS quartz watch, http://www.epson.co.jp/e/company/milestones/19_ags.pdf, 1998.
• 8: Cell phone power management requires small regulators with fast response, http://www.commsdesign.com/printableArticle/?articleID=12801994, 2002.
• 9: GNR1040 GPS receiver, http://www.glonavgps.com/images/glonav_gnr1040_pb.pdf, 2004.
• 10: Samsung Helix, Nexus and Pioneer Inno power consumption, http://www.orbitcast.com/archives/samsung-helix-nexus-and-pioneer-inno-power-consumption.html, 2006.
• 11: R. Amirtharajah and A. Chandrakasan. Self-powered signal processing using vibration-based power generation. IEEE J. Solid-State Circuits, 33:687--695, 1998.
• 12: N. Bharatula, S. Ossevoort, M. Stäger, and G. Tröster. Towards wearable autonomous microsystems. In Pervasive04, pages 225--237, 2004.
• 13: T. Büren, P. Mitcheson, T. Green, E. Yeatman, A. Homes, and G. Tröster. Optimization of inertial micropower generators for human walking motion. IEEE J. Sensors, 6(1):28--38, 2006.
• 14: A. Chapuis and E. Jaquet. The History of the Self-Winding Watch. Roto-Sadag, 1956.
• 15: J. Donelan, Q. Li, V. Naing, J. Hoffer, D. Weber, and A. Kuo. Biomechanical energy harvesting: Generating electricity during walking with minimal user effort. Science, 319(5864):807--810, 2008.
• 16: C. Hierolda. Low power integrated pressure sensor system for medical applications. Sensors and Actuators A: Physical, 73(1--2):1261--1265, 1999.
• 17: W. Huynh, J. Dittmer, and A. Alivisatos. Hybrid Nanorod-Polymer solar cells. Science, 295(5564):2425--2427, 2002.
• 18: Gaurav Mathur , Peter Desnoyers , Deepak Ganesan , Prashant Shenoy, Ultra-low power data storage for sensor networks, Proceedings of the 5th international conference on Information processing in sensor networks, April 19-21, 2006, Nashville, Tennessee, USA [doi>10.1145/1127777.1127833]
• 19: P. Mitcheson, T. Green, E. Yeatman, and A. Holmes. Architectures for vibration-driven micropower generators. IEEE J. MEMS, 13(3):429--440, 2004.
• 20: Joseph A. Paradiso, Systems for human-powered mobile computing, Proceedings of the 43rd annual conference on Design automation, July 24-28, 2006, San Francisco, CA, USA [doi>10.1145/1146909.1147074]
• 21: Joseph A. Paradiso , Mark Feldmeier, A Compact, Wireless, Self-Powered Pushbutton Controller, Proceedings of the 3rd international conference on Ubiquitous Computing, p.299-304, September 30-October 02, 2001, Atlanta, Georgia, USA
• 22: Joseph A. Paradiso , Thad Starner, Energy Scavenging for Mobile and Wireless Electronics, IEEE Pervasive Computing, v.4 n.1, p.18-27, January 2005 [doi>10.1109/MPRV.2005.9]
• 23: S. Rhee, B.-H. Yang, and H. Asada. Artifact-resistant, power-efficient design of finger-ring plethysmographic sensors part i:Design and analysis. In EMBS00, pages 2792--2795, 2000.
• 24: L. Rome, L. Flynn, E. Goldman, and T. Yoo. Generating electricity while walking with loads. Science, 309(5741):1725--1728, 2005.
• 25: A. Sadat, H. Qu, C. Yu, J. S. Yuan, and H. Xie. Low-power CMOS wireless MEMS motion sensor for physiological activity monitoring. IEEE Trans. Circuits Syst, 52(12):2539--2551, 2005.
• 26: J. Sauerbrey, S. Landsiedel, and R. Thewes. A 0.5-v 1-μw successive approximation ADC. IEEE J. Solid-State Circuits, 38(7):1261--1265, 2003.
• 27: Nathan S. Shenck , Joseph A. Paradiso, Energy Scavenging with Shoe-Mounted Piezoelectrics, IEEE Micro, v.21 n.3, p.30-42, May 2001 [doi>10.1109/40.928763]
• 28: T. Starner, Human-powered wearable computing, IBM Systems Journal, v.35 n.3-4, p.618-629, 1996
• 29: T. Starner and J. Paradiso. Human-generated power for mobile electronics. Low-Power Electronics Design, CRC Press, chapter 45, pages 1--35, 2004.
• 30: M. Strasser. Miniaturized thermoelectric generators based on poly-Si and poly-SiGe surface micromachining. Sensors and Actuators A: Physical, 97--98:535--542, 2002.
• 31: C. Williams and R. Yates. Analysis of a micro-electric generator for microsystems. Sensors and Actuators A: Physical, 52:8--11, 1996.
• 32: D. Yates and A. Holmes. Micro power radio module. ORESTEIA IST project, 2003.
• 33: E. Yeatman. Advances in power sources for wireless sensor nodes. In BSN06, pages 20--21, 2004.

INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  C. Computer Systems Organization
  C.5 COMPUTER SYSTEM IMPLEMENTATION
      C.5.3 Microcomputers

General Terms:
Experimentation, Human Factors

Keywords:
human-powered devices, inertial power harvesting