Natural Biopolymer-based Triboelectric Nanogenerators via Fast, Facile, Scalable Solution Blowing

Here, we fabricated nanofiber (NF)-based triboelectric nanogenerators (TENGs) from natural biopolymers using the industrially scalable solution blowing. This technique eliminates severe restrictions on solutions to be used, and allows one to achieve biocompatible devices. Here solutions of soy protein and lignin were blown into continuous monolithic NFs of hundreds of nanometers in diameter. The technique we employed yields large-area NF mats within tens of minutes, and has never been employed to form TENGs. Furthermore, in contrast to electrospun and meltblown fiber mats, solution–blown NF mats are much fluffier/porous, which is beneficial for achieving higher voltages by means of triboelectricity. In particular, triboelectricity generated by our biopolymer-based TENGs revealed that they hold great promise as sustainable and environmentally-friendly self-powered devices for biomedical applications with the highest efficiency in their class. Moreover, these are the first nano-textured plant-derived biopolymer-made TENGs.