Paper-Thin Device Generates Power, Morphs Into Foldable Microphone

Michigan State University researchers introduce a super-thin flexible device that generates energy from human motion and can also act as a loudspeaker and microphone. The audio breakthrough could lead to such consumer products like a foldable loudspeaker or a voice-activated security patch for computers. Last year, the Michigan team successfully demonstrated their device - known as a ferroelectret nanogenerator, or FENG  - by using it to power a keyboard, LED lights, and an LCD touch-screen. That process worked with a finger swipe to activate the devices - converting mechanical energy to electrical energy. The current breakthrough extends the FENG's usability. The researchers discovered the material can act as a microphone by capturing the vibrations from sound, or mechanical energy, and converting it to electrical energy, as well as a loudspeaker - by operating the opposite way, converting electrical energy to mechanical energy.

Transcript

00:00:04 Imagine charging your phone's battery by going for a walk. Or playing the fight song using your team's flag. MSU Engineering Professor Nelson Sepulveda and his team have created flexible, paper-thin electronic material that... It could capture the energy from the human motion and harvest it and use it. It's called the FENG, short for ferroelectret nanogenerator. It works by converting mechanical energy into electrical energy and vice versa. In the team's latest breakthrough, the FENG acts as a loudspeaker. Objects embedded with the revolutionary material can also act as a microphone. The audio breakthrough could eventually lead to such consumer products as a voice-activated security patch for conputers,

00:00:41 a foldable loudspeaker, and even a talking newspaper.