System Demonstration and Characterization of a Self-Biased Magnetoelectric Wireless Power Transfer System for Biomedical Implants

Magnetoelectric (ME) wireless power transfer systems (WPTS) offer a way to power small biomedical implants. We design a small (12 x 5 x 1.5 mm³) self-biased ME WPTS to power a small, low-powered temperature sensor. At 80 µT, the ME WPTS can deliver 221.5 µW to a temperature sensor, allowing it to take a temperature reading and transmit its data via Bluetooth radio. We define a figure of merit, FME, to compare ME WPTS designed to power biomedical implants against one another. We find that our ME WPTS outperforms all but one of the ME WPTS designed for biomedical implants. However, we believe our self-biased ME WPTS is more viable for use inside the human body because it does not require permanent magnets to be implanted along with the ME receiver.