Device can harvest wind energy from the breeze made when you walk

By Layal Liverpool

Peter Cade/Getty Images

A small device can harvest energy from the breeze generated as you walk and could potentially be used to power your gadgets.

The apparatus, developed by Ya Yang at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing and his colleagues, takes advantage of the triboelectric effect. This occurs when certain materials become electrically charged as they rub together. The researchers used an 8-centimetre-long tube containing two thin films, each made up of a layer of plastic on top of a layer of silver that acts as an electrode.

The two films flutter …