Technology evolution from self-powered sensors to AIoT enabled smart homes

The need of self-powered sensors and self-sustainable micro-/nano-systems is increasing for smart home applications. With the aid of the fifth-generation (5G) wireless communication and the artificial intelligence (AI) technology, numerous sensors can form an artificial intelligence of things (AIoT) system with a cloud computing server to collect, store, process, analyze data, and control the system. In this review, we briefly introduce the major sensor transducing mechanisms and the corresponding representative sensors. Then we emphasize the discussion of triboelectric sensors and their use as various types of human machine interfaces (HMIs). Regarding integrated self-sustainable systems with energy storage function for more general application scenarios, we present the recent advances of integration of triboelectric nanogenerator with supercapacitors, lithium-ion batteries, and solar cells. The development of materials and configurations with novel functionalities to improve the system performance are discussed. We present the state-of-the-art works based on the synergy between wearable sensors and AI technology, highlighting the system-level function of analyzing abundant sensory data, recognizing events, and making decisions accordingly. We wrap up the review by providing our perspectives of future development of self-powered sensors and self-sustainable micro-/nano-systems towards improved wearability, multifunctionality, better self-sustainability via multi-domain energy harvesting and storage technology integration, and higher-level intelligence for complex scenarios.