Title:  Applications of Additive Manufacturing Technologies to Ambient Energy Harvesters for Microwave and Millimeter-Wave Autonomous Wireless Sensing Networks and 3D Packaging Integration

Committee:

Dr. Manos Tentzeris, ECE, Chair , Advisor

Dr. Andrew Peterson, ECE

Dr. Gregory Durgin, ECE

Dr. Madhavan Swaminathan, ECE

Dr. Pulugurtha Raj, FIU

Abstract: The objectives of my research are developing new RF and mm-wave energy harvester topologies and realize them with a new additive manufacturing fabrication process. The proposed energy harvester topologies are utilized to achieve energy-autonomous wireless sensing networks for 5G communication and IoT solutions. The developed additive manufacturing fabrication process is adopted to realize not only energy harvesters but also mm-wave IC packaging process. This work utilizes additive manufacturing processes to realize various innovative topologies of energy harvesters to harvest more power and achieve higher rectification efficiency with smaller sizes. Additive manufacturing processes are also used to demonstrate the first on-body sensing network, energy-autonomous microfluidic sensing systems, and a fully functional energy-autonomous 5G SiP design with an integrated mm-wave energy harvester. The proposed topologies are suitable for smart city, smart skin, and IoT applications.