The sweat from your fingertips can now be transformed into energy. Thanks to the team of scientists at the University of California San Diego. This wearable in appearance is similar to a band-aid and is flexible enough to be wrapped around fingertips. This will then start converting human sweat into electrical energy that can be used to charge smartwatches and the like.
The scientists say that such a technology hasn’t been discovered before. This will be useful and produce energy without having to do rigorous physical activity. The fingers will continuously produce sweat even when the person is not doing any hardcore physical activity. This sweat is enough for the wearable to produce electrical energy. It can even produce “hundreds of millijoules of energy” when the body is at rest or is sleeping. This bioenergy harvester is thus the most efficient of the lot as claimed by them. This will also help wearable electronics in the future on a large scale. Their research paper titled “A passive perspiration biofuel cell: High energy return on investment” is published in the journal, Joule.
The team members claim that the wearable is the most convenient bioenergy harvester and will be more accessible to everyone. The device can generate almost 400mJ of energy from a 10-hour sleep. This energy equals that of the energy required to run an electronic wristwatch for 24 hours. Typing and using the mouse will also generate 30mJ if done for an hour.
Lu Yin, a member of the team said that they will put it into practical use for purposes like powering sensors and displays.
