An improved magnetoelectric vibration energy harvester for wireless sensors

An energy harvester is presented to scavenge ambient vibration energy using Terfenol-D/PMN-PT/Terfenol-D laminate magnetoelectric transducers. The harvester uses eight magnets to make up a magnetic circuit to produce a concentrated flux gradient, which makes the harvester generate high power. The nonlinear vibration characteristics and the electrical-output performances of the harvester at resonance are analyzed. A prototype has been fabricated and tested. The experimental results are in agreement with the analytical results. The prototype can produce a sufficient power to supply low consumption wireless sensors applied in the Internet of Things.