Achieving intrinsic discharge effect in contact-separation TENG by extending the theoretical model for compressible tribo-materials

Triboelectric nanogenerators (TENGs) have witnessed rapid development in recent years as a promising clean energy technology. However, due to their inherently high output impedance, TENGs face significant challenges in directly powering electronic devices/systems, making impedance matching with low power consumption and high integration a persistent and critical issue. In this study, we propose a strategy by introducing compressible tribo-materials into a contact-separation mode TENG (CS-TENG), which enables the generation of output waveforms with intrinsic instantaneous discharge characteristics, allowing the TENG to be an energy harvester with an instantaneous discharge function with much reduced impedance. A theoretical extension of the typical CS-TENG theoretical model is established, followed by the simulating and experimental validation under different influencing factors. Under practically low-load conditions, the instantaneous discharge ratio (IDR) of the developed TENG reaches up to 96.8 %, and its capability of eliminating impedance mismatch to a LC resonant tank for oscillating signal generation and wireless transmission is successfully demonstrated. These findings highlight the considerable potential of the proposed design for applications in self-powered sensing systems and wireless energy transfer.