In terms of power generation, lower frequency operation allows for more energy and greater acceleration selection in mechanical vibration energy harvesters. In order to manage natural frequencies for micro-scale MEMS applications, addition of a proof mass can be beneficial. In this work, an analytical model is extended to consider a proof mass to predict harvester performance. The resulting analytical, power-optimized, modal model of piezoelectric harvesters is verified by comparison to experiments. In both electrical and mechanical performance of the device, simulated results are in good agreement with the experimental measurements. While the models are scale-independent, their use can help provide guidelines to optimize the design of MEMS energy harvesters for various future applications.
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