Cosmetics‐to‐Energy: Paintable and Robust Triboelectric Nanogenerator Based on Nail‐Paints

Material genre for triboelectric nanogenerators (TENGs) is perhaps the most diverse, where the active layer can be prepared with a variety of unconventional materials such as several types of waste articles, different parts of plants, fruit peels and shells, fibres, silk, and animal‐origin products. Here, another and yet unexplored class of materials, cosmetic materials, have been reported, where nail‐paints (NPs) have been investigated as the active layer of the TENG. The constituents of NP, nitrocellulose and various aromatic plasticizers, impart tribo‐positive character to the resultant film. In vertical contact separation mode, NP‐TENG produces an open‐circuit voltage of ∼120 V and short‐circuit current of ∼12 µA with an aluminum layer, which increases to ∼400 V and ∼40 µA, respectively, with polydimethylsiloxane as the negative layer. With NP‐TENGs, energy is harvested seamlessly by drawing a layer of nail paint in any shape, colour, or pattern, which can be quickly modified to any other variant. Performance of NP‐TENGs is remarkably resistant against water immersion, oil application, sand contamination, temperature, and bending. With simple paint‐and‐produce processing, NP‐TENGs are a highly facile and accessible option for harvesting energy anytime and anywhere, where assembling and disassembling of TENG is as prompt as application and removal of nail‐paint for beautification.