Generation of Electrical Energy Using Fish Market Waste Fish Fin from Mechanical Motion for Battery-Less Self—Powered Wearable Sensors and IoT Devices

The main idea behind this study is to fabricate a cost-effective and eco-friendly source of electrical energy for battery-less IOT devices, sensors and small medical/electronic wearable devices, as per the UN’s sustainable development goal SDG 7 (affordable and clean energy). In this study, an electrical energy generation device triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) is designed and fabricated from fish fin, which is biocompatible, non-toxic, and treated as waste material in the fish market. The fish fin isolated from the waste of the fish is converted to the dielectric layer of the TENG, which is further utilized to convert ambient mechanical energy into useful electrical energy. The thermal stability of the material also has been tested using TGA, and it was observed that it was stable to work up to 100°C. Other biomaterial combinations of egg shell membrane, dog hairs, and tree cotton are also tested in this study. The output of the fish fin based fabricated TENG is utilized to power up 65 green LEDs connected in the series, which is equivalent to 130 V of voltage, and the current of 1.1µA was measured across a 1MΩ resistor. This output of the TENG was used to power up a small digital watch. The fabricated device can also be used as sensor to detect human motion. Graphical Abstract