Laminated pyroelectric generator with spin coated transparent poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) polystyrene sulfonate (PEDOT:PSS) electrodes for a flexible self-powered stimulator

Implantable devices are promising electronics in medicine, which can perform real-time monitoring for a variety of human-body physiological conditions and control the function of some failing organs. However, the technology to power implantable devices still has some remaining challenges. This work presents a transparent self-powered pyroelectric generator driven by near infrared radiation for wireless powering of electronics. The pyroelectric device uses a highly conductive polymer, PEDOT:PSS, formed as an electrode without the use of a complex transferring process. Due to the good match between the surface energy of the PEDOT electrode and PVDF, when combined with PVDF the resulting PEDOT/PVDF/PEDOT device possesses a highly adherent interface. The influence of the PEDOT thickness on the output voltage of the device has been investigated according to the difference in its infrared transmittance and absorbance. In addition, in order to enhance the output voltage while reducing the device temperature, a laminated pyroelectric generator, in which each cell is composed of a PEDOT/PVDF/PEDOT sandwich, was further developed taking advantage of the high infrared transmittance of PEDOT and PVDF. The proposed laminated pyroelectric device could generate up to 23.4 V with six laminated cells, an enhancement of approximately 212% compared to a single cell, which could directly light up an LCD and was applied for nerve stimulation of the sciatic nerve of a frog, indicating that the proposed self-powered device could be a candidate for implantable medical electronics.