Nico de Rooij

Nico de Rooij is Professor Emeritus of EPFL and previous Vice-President of CSEM SA. He was Professor of Microengineering at EPFL and Head of the Sensors, Actuators and Microsystems Laboratory ( SAMLAB ) from 2009 to 2016. At CSEM SA he was responsible for the EPFL CSEM coordination from 2012 to 2016. His research activities include the design, micro fabrication and application of miniaturized silicon based sensors, actuators, and microsystems. He authored and coauthored over 400 published journal papers in these areas.

He was Professor at the University of Neuchatel and Head of the Sensors, Actuators and Microsystems Laboratory (SAMLAB) from 1982 to 2008. Since October 1990 till October 1996 and again from October 2002 until June 2008, he has been the director of the Institute of Microtechnology of the University of Neuchatel (IMT UniNE). He lectured at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich (ETHZ), and since 1989, he has been a part-time professor at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Lausanne (EPFL). He has been appointed Vice-President of the CSEM SA in February 2008 and headed the newly created Microsystems Technology Division of CSEM SA, from 2008 until 2012. He was Director of EPFL's Institute of Microengineering (EPFL STI IMT) from 2009 to 2012, following the transfer of IMT Uni-NE to EPFL.

Dr. de Rooij is a Fellow of the IEEE and Fellow of the Institute of Physics (UK). He recieved the IEEE Jun-Ichi Nishizawa Gold Medal , the Schlumberger Prize as well as the MNE Fellow Award 2016 . He was awarded a Visiting Investigatorship Program (VIP) in MEMS/NEMS Systems by the A*STAR Science and Engineering Council (SERC) , Singapore, hosted by SIMTech , for the period 2005-2008.

Prof. de Rooij is Corresponding Member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences and Individual Member of the Swiss Academy of Engineering Sciences .

He has been serving on the Editorial Boards of the IEEE/ASME Journal of Microelectromechanical Systems (IEEE JMEMS) , the IEEE proceedings , the Journal of Micromechanics and Microengineering, JM & M, , the Sensors and Actuators ,and Sensors and Materials . He was Member of the Information and Communication technology jury of the BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Awards from 2009 to 2012.

Dr. de Rooij is (or was) Member of numerous international steering committees of conference series as well as

technical paper review panels including the steering committee of the International Conference on Solid-State

Sensors and Actuators and of Eurosensors. He acted as European Program Chairman of Transducers '87 and General Chairman of Transducers '89, Montreux, Switzerland.

He has supervised more than 70 Ph.D. students, who have successfully completed their Ph.D. thesis.

He received his M.Sc. degree in physical chemistry from the State University of Utrecht, The Netherlands, in 1975, and a Ph.D. degree from Twente University of Technology, The Netherlands, in 1978. From 1978 to 1982, he worked at the Research and Development Department of Cordis Europa N.V., The Netherlands.

Nonlinear piezoelectric vibration energy harvester with frequency-tuned impacting resonators for improving broadband performance at low frequencies

Danick Briand, Nico de Rooij, Robert Andrew Lockhart, Andres Felipe Vasquez Quintero

The paper reports on a nonlinear frequency up-converting vibration energy harvester with enhanced broadband performance below 50 Hz, which is attained by leveraging vibro-impact interaction between two high-frequency piezoelectric generators and two low-frequency resonators with commensurate natural frequencies in the 2:1 ratio. Finite element model was implemented to assess the proposed concept by treating the harvester as a vibro-impact coupled piezoelectric-circuit system. The model accommodates multiple mechanical contact pairs defined by nonlinear dissipative Hunt-Crossley contact force formulation. Effective design principles were applied to maximize power output including near-optimal positioning of the neutral plane in the generators and rational adjustment of response settling time. The fabricated proof-ofconcept device was tested in different clearance configurations and under varying harmonic excitation conditions to reveal rich nonlinear dynamics behavior. The measured hardening-type power frequency responses were examined to gain better insight into nonlinear resonance characteristics (instability jumps, frequency hysteresis, etc), which determine effectiveness of micro-power generation. It was demonstrated that the proposed dual-resonator energy harvester favorably harnesses nonlinear resonance amplification to deliver larger average power output (up to 37 mu W) and useable bandwidth (up to 9.5 Hz) in comparison to the conventional single-resonator counterparts (delivering up to 26 mu W and up to 7 Hz, respectively). The maximum normalized power density of the device is 41 mu W cm(-3) g(-2), while volume figure of merit and 3 dB or 1 dB bandwidth-based figures of merit reach 0.18%, 11 mu W cm(-3) g(-2) and 1.5%, respectively. The latter value indicates superior broadband performance of the device. Adoption of mean performance index and coefficient of variation as complementary figures of merit proved to be valuable in identifying device configuration that yields the most effective and stable broadband operation in a targeted frequency range.

IOP PUBLISHING LTD2019

A low-cost UWB sensor node powered by a piezoelectric harvester or solar cells

Cyril Botteron, Danick Briand, Nico de Rooij, Pierre-André Farine, Franz-Josef Haug, Pattanaphong Janphuang, Robert Andrew Lockhart, Christian Robert, Anja Skrivervik Favre, Gabriele Tasselli

We propose an autonomous battery-less wireless sensor node that combines on a single printed circuit board an ultra-wideband (UWB) transmitter and its printed antenna, together with a piezoelectric cantilever and a solar cell array to harvest vibrations and light energy, respectively. The co-design of the solar cell array with the printed UWB antenna allows a prototype size of only 85x35 mm2, i.e., less than 65% of a credit card size. Low-cost is achieved by using inexpensive FR4 dual-layer substrate, standard-ceramic capacitors, and low-cost harvesters. The vibrational energy scavenger is fabricated at the wafer scale based on commercially available bulk polycrystalline Lead Zirconate Titanate (PZT), and the solar cells are fabricated by depositing amorphous-Si on 0.5 mm thick glass substrate. The cold-startup time of the demonstrator is about 42 min under indoor-ambient light conditions, and about 34 min under 700 mg vibrations at a frequency of 100 Hz. Once started, the sensor requires only 12.6 µW to allow a transmission rate of one temperature sensor readout every 34 s, thanks to the UWB transmitter that consumes only 206 pJ per pulse and a custom protocol with a reduced overhead.

Elsevier2016

Nonlinear piezoelectric vibration energy harvester with frequency-tuned impacting resonators for improving broadband performance at low frequencies

Danick Briand, Nico de Rooij, Robert Andrew Lockhart, Andres Felipe Vasquez Quintero

IOP PUBLISHING LTD2019

Nonlinear piezoelectric vibration energy harvester with frequency-tuned impacting resonators for improving broadband performance at low frequencies

Highly transparent humidity sensor with thin cellulose acetate butyrate and hydrophobic AF1600X vapor permeating layers fabricated by screen printing

A low-cost UWB sensor node powered by a piezoelectric harvester or solar cells

Nonlinear piezoelectric vibration energy harvester with frequency-tuned impacting resonators for improving broadband performance at low frequencies

A low-cost UWB sensor node powered by a piezoelectric harvester or solar cells

Highly transparent humidity sensor with thin cellulose acetate butyrate and hydrophobic AF1600X vapor permeating layers fabricated by screen printing