Design of test bench apparatus for piezoelectric energy harvesters

Abstract

This thesis presents the design and analysis of an experimental test bench for the characterization of piezoelectric microelectromechanical system (MEMS) energy harvester being developed by the Micro & Nano Systems Laboratory research group at MIT. Piezoelectric MEMS energy harvesters are micro-devices that are able to harvest energy from their ambient vibrations using piezoelectric material property, and many different designs are being researched by the Micro & Nano Systems Laboratory. In order to analyze the different designs, it is crucial to have a flexible test bench, and the test bench created in this thesis allows data to be gathered easily from different energy harvesters. After the test bench is designed and created, it is used to excite a linear cantilever beam energy harvester system at different frequencies and values for open circuit voltage, resonance frequency, and maximum power are calculated from the collected experimental data. In addition, theory behind linear and nonlinear energy harvester systems is investigated and important definitions, characteristics, and equations are summarized in this thesis.