Prof. Rudra Pratap's Research Group

Perspective view of a typical piezoelectric energy harvesting cantilever

Representation of power generated by a piezoelectric energy harvester. Click Here

Energy harvesters are transducers that generally convert ambient energy into usable electrical energy. Apart from the obvious sources such as solar and wind energy, there are other low energy sources that are widely distributed on our planet. One such source is mechanical vibration. Such vibrations are fairly ubiquitous and provide a potential source for energy harvesting that can be readily used in low power applications such as powering micro-sensors or even sensor nodes. Piezoelectric resonant cantilevers are the most convenient structures to harvest energy from vibrations and produce usable electrical energy. Improving the performance of these harvesters by design is a pivotal step as the energy in ambient vibrations is innately low.  We work on design, analysis, fabrication, and application of such energy harvesters. Our research includes development of appropriate piezoelectric materials with nanostructures that can lead to higher efficiency harvesters. Recently, we have figured out power scaling in MEMS harvesters that provides insights into various aspects of harvester design making the multidimensional design space more tractable. We also work on hybrid harvesters where we combine piezoelectric and electrodynamic transduction for maximal energy harvesting.

MEMS Lab, Centre for Nano Science and Engineering, Indian Institute of Science. Bangalore-560012

Phone: +91 (80) 2293 3250, +91 (80) 2360 8659   Fax: +91 (80) 2360 1648  Email: pratap@iisc.ac.in, memslab@iisc.ac.in