Surprising technology turns grapefruit peel into power generator

Grapefruit is a large citrus fruit widely grown in Southeast and East Asia, with a remarkably thick peel that is often discarded. Photo: @ Healthline.

However, in a recent study, researchers from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign investigated ways to reuse this grapefruit peel biomass, developing a tool that could power small electronic devices. Photo: @Marianne Stein/Dorin Puha.

Grapefruit peels have two main parts: a thin outer layer and a thick, white inner layer. The white part is soft and spongy, and feels like a sponge when you press it. Some people have used this peel to extract compounds for essential oils, or pectin, but here, the experts have used this naturally porous structure for a different purpose. Photo: @ The Foodie Next Door.

A typical grapefruit weighs between 1 and 2 kilograms, with the peel accounting for 30 to 50 percent of its total weight. In their work, the researchers peeled the fruit, removing the outermost layer, and then processed the thick, spongy white peel inside. Photo: @This Bago Girl.

They cut it into smaller pieces and freeze-dried it to preserve its unique three-dimensional porous structure. The sample was then stored in different humidity conditions for further analysis. Photo: @Nature.

By examining the chemical composition and mechanical properties of this white porous shell after freeze-drying, the research team successfully built a prototype device that converts mechanical energy into electrical energy using the principle of contact electrochemistry. Photo: @Tech Xplore.

This device consists of a piece of processed grapefruit peel biomass and a plastic film (polyimide), which are used as two triboelectric layers that come into contact with each other when an external force is applied. Photo: @link.springer.

They attached copper foil electrodes to each of these layers and evaluated how well the prototype device converted external mechanical energy into electricity. Photo: @ Taylor & Francis Online.

By gently rubbing the two layers of this material with your fingers, the prototype device successfully and efficiently converted external mechanical energy into electricity, and it lit up about 20 light-emitting diodes (a semiconductor light source that emits light when an electric current is passed through it). Photo: @iStock.

“This application has great potential to convert wasted resources into useful energy-generating materials. We also found that, thanks to the natural porous structure of grapefruit peel, the triboelectric device prototype based on it can be extremely sensitive to force and frequency. This will inspire us to develop sensors that can be attached to the human body to monitor biomechanics,” said Yi-Cheng Wang, Associate Professor in the Department of Food Science and Human Nutrition, College of Agricultural , Consumer and Environmental Sciences at Illinois State. Photo: @Alibaba.

“If we can recycle grapefruit peels into higher-value products instead of just throwing them away, we can not only reduce waste from grapefruit production, consumption, and juicing, but also create more value from food and agricultural waste,” added study co-author Yi-Cheng Wang. Photo: @iStock.

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