A University of Texas-Arlington research associate and electrical engineering professor designed a micro-windmill that generates wind energy and may become an innovative solution to cell phone batteries constantly in need of recharging. The device is roughly 1.8 mm at its widest point—so hundreds of them could be embedded in a sleeve for a cell phone. Wind, created by waving the cell phone in air or holding it near an open window on a windy day, would generate the electricity that could be collected by the cell phone’s battery.
Smitha Rao designed the windmills and blended origami concepts into conventional wafer-scale semiconductor device layouts. The result is that complex 3D moveable mechanical structures can self-assemble from 2D metal pieces using planar multilayer electroplating techniques optimized by WinMEMS Technologies Co., a Taiwanese fabrication foundry. www.uta.edu.
Image caption — A micro-windmill is pictured on the face of a penny. Courtesy of UT Arlington.
