Title :
System-On-Mud: Ultra-Low Power Oceanic Sensing Platform Powered by Small-Scale Benthic Microbial Fuel Cells
Author :
Inhee Lee ; Gyouho Kim ; Suyoung Bang ; Wolfe, Adriane ; Bell, Richard ; Seokhyeon Jeong ; Yejoong Kim ; Kagan, Jeffrey ; Arias-Thode, Meriah ; Chadwick, Bart ; Sylvester, Dennis ; Blaauw, David ; Yoonmyung Lee
Author_Institution :
Dept. of Electr. Eng. & Comput. Sci., Univ. of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA
Abstract :
A self-sustainable sensing platform powered entirely by small-scale benthic microbial fuel cells (MFCs) for oceanic sensing applications is presented. An ultra-low power chip featuring an ARM Cortex-M0 processor, 3 kB of SRAM, and power management unit (PMU) is designed to consume 11 nW in sleep mode for perpetual sensing operation. The PMU includes a switched-capacitor DC/DC converter designed for efficient energy harvesting and step-down conversion for a wide range of input and output power. A small-scale MFC with 21.3 cm2 anode surface area was connected to the PMU to charge a thin-film battery of 1 mAh capacity. A 49.3-hour long-term experiment with 8-min sleep interval and 1-s wake-up time demonstrated the sustainability of system-on-mud concept. During sleep mode operation, the system charges the 4 V battery at 380 nA from the micro-MFC generating 5.4 μW of power, which allows up to 20 mA of active mode current with net energy neutrality.
Keywords :
DC-DC power convertors; SRAM chips; electrochemical electrodes; energy harvesting; low-power electronics; microbial fuel cells; microprocessor chips; oceanographic techniques; switched capacitor networks; ARM Cortex-M0 processor; SRAM; active mode current; anode surface area; current 380 nA; energy harvesting; perpetual sensing operation; power 11 nW; power 5.4 muW; power management unit; self-sustainable sensing platform; sleep mode operation; small-scale benthic microbial fuel cells; step-down conversion; storage capacity 3 Kbit; switched-capacitor DC/DC converter; system-on-mud; thin-film battery; time 1 s; time 49.3 hr; time 8 min; ultra-low power chip; ultra-low power oceanic sensing platform; voltage 4 V; Anodes; Batteries; Capacitors; Logic gates; Phasor measurement units; Sensors; Switches; Capacitive power management; MFCs; energy harvesting; microbial fuel cells; oceanic system; sensor node; switched-capacitor DC/DC converter;
Journal_Title :
Circuits and Systems I: Regular Papers, IEEE Transactions on
DOI :
10.1109/TCSI.2015.2390559
