Flow Enabled Voltage Generation 

For this project, our goal is to design, test and build a pre-commercial prototype of the voltage generating apparatus based of the Bandaru Unit Cell. In order to compete in the InDEEP competition, the new cell design must able to out perform the existing one (50mV) and be integral to one another while displaying additive properties (i.e. two cells attached together produce twice the amount of voltage).

Palaemus Oceanic is an engineering contractor that specializes in deep sea maritime sensing technologies. They have partnered with the Bandaru lab at UCSD to compete in the Department of Energy’s InDEEP competition. This $2.3 million dollar competition seeks to develop novel technologies that convert wave energy into usable electricity, with the larger goal of being able to generate electricity at the grid scale. 

A major limiting factor for ocean exploration is power availability and the need for persistent, expendable, survivable instruments that can reliably monitor the ocean for longer durations. Existing power systems have numerous issues, such as size, weight, unpredictability of power source and too much required maintenance.

A new approach to solve this issue is utilizing P.R. Bandaru's, a professor at UCSD, research in electrokinetic technology. This idea involves the relative motion of charged species (e.g., seawater flowing through a channel) with respect to the channel substrate (channel walls). When the substrate is charged, an electrical double layer (EDL) forms. On application of pressure, driven by wave or current energy, the charge separation and relative movement yields a voltage.