A new blog post on the EDN Network titled Static Electricity Aims To Power Wearable Devices discusses how static electricity may be used for energy harvesting to power devices such as fitness bands, medical monitoring systems, and watches.
In addition to the discussion about using static electricity for the energy that it can provide, the post contains some other important information about ESD:
“ESD causes more than one-third of integrated circuit field failures, showing up as leakage, short circuits, burnout, contact damage, gate oxide rupture, and resistor-metal interface damage. As feature sizes shrink, the problem is only getting worse.”
“The cause of electrostatic buildup is the triboelectric effect: material becomes electrically charged after it contacts a different material through friction. Although this is one of the most frequently experienced effects in everyday life, the precise mechanism is still being studied.”