Optimal Design and Frequency Tuning of a Dual-Folded Piezoelectric Harvester for Leadless Pacemaker Applications

Leadless pacemakers require permanent power sources to support long-term operation and eliminate the need for replacement surgeries. This study introduces a dual-folded beam piezoelectric energy harvester (PEH) designed to harvest energy from heartbeat-induced vibrations for powering leadless pacemakers. To simplify the design and reduce computational complexity, a discrete modeling approach is developed under base excitation with the lowest acceleration amplitude of heart vibrations. The results show that incorporating a dual-folded beam configuration with both a link mass and a tip mass allow tuning of the harvester’s resonant frequency within the range of heart vibrations. Parametric analyses of the main system variables including link mass, tip mass, piezoelectric thickness, substrate thickness, and electrical load resistance indicate that optimal values can be determined for these parameters to maximize the harvested output power. The Genetic algorithm is used to optimize the value of system parameters to maximize the total average output power while satisfying dimensional constraints. The optimized model achieves a resonant frequency within the cardiac band (1–50 Hz), ensuring dimensional compatibility with the leadless pacemaker. Simulation results demonstrate that the optimized device increases the average output power from 4.83 μ W to 257.64 μ W , while simultaneously reducing the resonant frequency from 52.46 Hz to 20.21 Hz, indicating its potential as a compact power supply for leadless pacemakers.