Transferring electrical energy between two dielectric elastomer actuators

Soft dielectric elastomer (DE) devices used for actuation and power generation are typically operated at kilovolt potential. Effective recovery of the electrical energy inherently stored during operation will greatly improve the efficiency of a DE device. One method of energy recovery involves the use of DC-DC step-down circuits to convert the high voltage energy into a low voltage form. The energy would then go to a storage component and eventually be reconverted back to high voltage for recharging the DE. However, the voltage conversion process incurs significant energy loss. Simply transferring the energy to a capacitor or another DE without large changes in the voltage can achieve better efficiencies. In our experiments, we achieved 51% energy transfer from one DE to another DE of similar size. Improved energy transfer is expected with lower electrode resistance.