Thermoelectric generators (TEGs) demonstrate great potential for flexible and wearable electronics due to the direct electrical energy harvested from waste heat. Good wearability requires high mechanical flexibility and preferable stretchability, while current TEGs are primarily developed with rigid or non-stretchable components, which do not conform well to human skin or accommodate human motions, thus hindering further applications. Herein, a wavy architecture was proposed to fabricate stretchable TEGs, wherein a stretchable and self-healable hydrogel was employed as a device substrate, and intrinsically flexible, high-performance thermoelectric (TE) films were attached to form wavy morphologies. The wavy-structured TEG could be stretched readily to 300%; in the meantime. It could sustain a stable energy output able to retain more than 90% TE performance, thus, outperforming most of the reported state-of-the-art TE materials and TEGs. It also demonstrated a desired device-level self-rescuing capability that originated from the effective self-healing of the hydrogel and the wavy structure of TE legs, thereby providing constant energy supply upon injuries or damages. This work offers a promising approach to the design of next-generation stretchable and wearable TEGs.

由于从废热中收集直接电能，热电发电机 (TEG) 在柔性和可穿戴电子产品方面表现出巨大的潜力。良好的耐磨性需要较高的机械柔韧性和较好的拉伸性，而目前的 TEG 主要由刚性或不可拉伸的组件开发，这些组件不能很好地贴合人体皮肤或适应人体运动，从而阻碍了进一步的应用。在本文中，提出了一种波浪结构来制造可拉伸的 TEG，其中采用可拉伸和自修复的水凝胶作为器件基底​​，并附着本质上柔韧的高性能热电 (TE) 薄膜以形成波浪形形态。波浪结构的 TEG 可以很容易地拉伸到 300%；同时。它可以维持稳定的能量输出，能够保持超过 90% 的 TE 性能，因此，其性能优于大多数报道的最先进的 TE 材料和 TEG。它还展示了一种理想的设备级自救能力，该能力源于水凝胶的有效自愈能力和 TE 腿的波浪结构，从而在受伤或损坏时提供持续的能量供应。这项工作为设计下一代可拉伸和可穿戴 TEG 提供了一种很有前景的方法。