Enhancing the Output Charge Density of Triboelectric Nanogenerator via Building Charge Blocking Layer

The surface charge density of the tribo-layer is the paramount parameter to determine the electrical output of triboelectric nanogenerator(TENG). Most previous works focused on high dielectric metal particle doping. However, metal nanoparticles will form charge leakage channels in the triboelectric layer, which will reduce the surface charge density and thus weaken the output of TENG. In this paper, a new doping scheme of SiO
₂
@Ag composite particles was proposed. By attaching Ag nanoparticles to the surface of SiO
₂
microspheres, the problem of Ag nanoparticles being easily agglomerated due to the surface potential energy was not only solved, but the SiO
₂
microspheres could construct a blocking layer in the triboelectric layer to prevent the leakage of surface charges. The output performance of reported TENG significantly yielded 241 μC/m
²
in charge density, giving over 3.45-fold enhancement to the unadulterated TENG. As such, the demonstrated TENG could potentially serve as sensitive electromechanical energy conversion device, and provides a promising power solution for MEMS transducers and energy harvesting applications.