Nafion-mediated barium titanate-polymer composite nanofibers-based triboelectric nanogenerator for self-powered smart street and home control system

Incorporation of inorganic materials into a polymer matrix has drawn significant interest, as the process can improve the mechanical and triboelectric properties of composite products. However, well dispersion and long-term stability of the developed composites remain a challenge. In this paper, we propose a novel Nafion-functionalized barium titanate nanoparticles (BaTiO3 NPs)/polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) composite nanofibers based high-performance triboelectric nanogenerator (NBP-TENG), which can serve as a self-powered human-machine interface for a smart control system. Specifically, our method of introducing Nafion provides an excellent dispersion of BaTiO3 into the PVDF matrix. As a result, a highly stable dispersion is maintained for almost 6 months without any noticeable precipitation or agglomeration. Consequently, the excellent dispersion enhances the effective stress transfer at the interface between the BaTiO3 and PVDF, resulting in the remarkably improved negative surface potential in the BaTiO3/PVDF homogeneous composite nanofibers. The NBP-TENG allows the generation of high output voltage, current density, and power density of 307 V, 1.8 µA/cm2, and 1.12 mW/cm2, respectively, which are enhanced by ∼ 6.3, 7.1, and 3.7 times, respectively, compared to pristine PVDF nanofibers. The NBP-TENG is capable of powering dozens of commercial LEDs connected in series by manual tapping and demonstrates stable output performance even after 10,000 cycles of repeated contact separation. Moreover, the NBP-TENG can be utilized as a self-powered human-machine interactive interface for smart street and home control systems, with the advantages of promising reliability, cost-effectiveness, energy efficiency, and practicality.