GA zero-power devices will harvest energy from their immediate surroundings from light, vibrations, temperature differences, and electromagnetic radiation. By combining these sources of energy with low-power electronics, researchers are aiming to develop completely autonomous systems at an affordable price.
The science of zero-power involves research on novel materials, devices, and system architecture that could enable energy savings by a factor of up to 1000 for the computation, communication and sensing functions. At the same time, advanced, smart, multi-harvesting interfaces will lead to an improvement factor of 100 in the harvesters’ supplied energy.
At a time when portability is the key word and energy supply is raising concerns, both the economic and ecological stakes are huge.
Zero Power in Physical Smart Autonomous Systems
The monitoring of physiological parameters can provide important information for medical investigation. Today’s state-of-the-art monitoring is restricted to medical environments, because of the apparatus size, energy requirements, limited connectivity and the necessity of medically trained personnel for data interpretation.
The design of new, high-sensitivity sensor devices with minimal power consumption and reduced invasiveness is key to enable continuous monitoring. Complemented by specially-designed networking systems, the concept of small building blocks including multi-parametric distributed sensing and automated diagnosis will drastically reduce development costs, and will open up the possibility of single-use autonomous health monitoring devices that will look like today’s disposable bandage. Overall, this increased monitoring in a wider population will enable risk factor screening on a large scale in modern society, and result in a new dimension of preventive health care for a better life.