Large-scale deployment of low-power sensing and computing units calls for unique power management solutions to overcome the inconvenience, costs, and waste problems associated with batteries. Energy harvesting offers an exciting solution to the battery problem, enabling circuits that can power themselves on-site from available ambient energy. Magnetic energy harvesters (MEHs), configured as current transformers, extract energy from the magnetic fields surrounding current-carrying power lines. As maximum power harvest occurs when a magnetic core is on the verge of saturation or saturated to some degree, modeling of magnetic energy harvesters is inherently difficult and nonlinear. This article proposes generalized analytical methods for modeling magnetic energy harvester behavior and validates these methods along with existing circuit model techniques. Intuition for core saturation behavior is presented and agreement with existing models is discussed. The analysis is motivated by addressing the feasibility of a split core magnetic energy harvester to power a microcontroller unit, and the models are experimentally validated for multiple harvester cores.

中文翻译：

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磁能采集器的广义分析方法


低功耗传感和计算单元的大规模部署需要独特的电源管理解决方案，以克服与电池相关的不便、成本和浪费问题。能量收集为电池问题提供了令人兴奋的解决方案，使电路能够利用可用的环境能量在现场自行供电。磁能采集器 (MEH) 配置为电流互感器，从载流电源线周围的磁场中提取能量。由于最大功率收集发生在磁芯处于饱和边缘或饱和到一定程度时，磁能量收集器的建模本质上是困难且非线性的。本文提出了用于对磁能量收集器行为进行建模的通用分析方法，并验证了这些方法以及现有的电路模型技术。提出了磁芯饱和行为的直觉，并讨论了与现有模型的一致性。该分析的动机是解决分体磁能收集器为微控制器单元供电的可行性，并且这些模型针对多个收集器磁芯进行了实验验证。