Scientists create the world's first portable antenna for collecting electricity from 5G networks

A research team from the Georgia Institute of Technology managed to create the world's first rectifying antenna the size of a playing card, which was printed on a 3D printer. At the same time, the created portable antenna was able to collect electricity from 5G radiation and transmit it to power portable gadgets.

5G wireless network and its prospects

For years, scientists around the world have been looking for ways to harness the energy that travels through the air through the use of wireless communications. There were several working projects to extract electricity from Wi-Fi signals, but there were few prospects for their full-scale implementation.

This is because the collection of energy in the millimeter range required the presence of fairly massive receiving antennas, which at the same time had to be strictly oriented towards the millimeter-wave source radiation. Therefore, such installations were unprofitable and largely useless.

But that all changed after the 5G network was developed. After all, the new network was created for almost instantaneous transfer of large amounts of data with minimal latency.

For these purposes, 5G transmitters have been made powerful enough with a high radiation density. And thus, a wireless power grid was created that is quite capable of providing power to devices at distances that significantly exceed all existing technologies.

Thus, it became possible to replace tens of millions of batteries with wireless sensors, especially in the smart home segment. All that remains is to create a sufficiently effective antenna to collect this energy.

New portable antenna and its prospects

Engineers at the Georgia Institute of Technology solved the antenna problem by using the so-called Rothman lens, which is a pointed plate in the center of the map.

The use of this lens allows, for example, radar systems to observe targets in several directions without changing the position of the antenna. Therefore, the engineers decided to use this lens to collect electricity as well.

The result is a printed flexible energy harvesting system completely independent of direction of the emitter, and capable of receiving energy from any direction 21 times more than existing analogs.

So far, we are not talking about the collection of large capacities. So existing prototypes can collect about 6 microwatts at a distance of about 180 meters from the 5G emitter.

But even this energy will be more than enough to power small sensors and devices, especially in the segment of the Internet of Things.

And the fact that these antennas are printable and work even in a bent position indicates that they (antennas) can be used even in wearable gadgets.

What are the development prospects

Considering that, most likely, 5G networks will cover huge areas, then commercial the use of such antennas in many devices will allow replacing millions of batteries with wireless sensors.

This will not only save a huge amount of fairly rare metals (used in production of batteries), but will also allow more efficient use of energy that was consumed just.

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