One of the many major challenges of mobile systems such as wearables, is the power source. Scientists and engineers are constantly figuring out smaller, more efficient, cheaper and more powerful ways to power our devices. One area of investigation is around the power that is generated from our own body movements. According to Henry Fountain of the New York Times, it doesn’t take much, even a couch potato can generate power. For example, the act of breathing can generate about a watt of power. The challenge is how to harvest that engery and put it to good use.

“Michael C. McAlpine of Princeton and colleagues have developed a promising approach for converting body movements into electricity: printing piezoelectric crystals onto flexible, biocompatible rubberlike material. Continue reading on The New York Times.

I would love to get my hands on one of these!

Photo by Frank Wojciechowski.