Supercapacitors for a MEMS Electrochemical Power Supply

In the future the Air Force will need covert, autonomous Micro Air Deployed Munitions (MADM) to engage dispersed targets in varied terrains. Miniaturized power is critical to realizing these advanced systems. Traditional power engineering approaches oversize the battery to provide high currents on start-up, adding significant weight and volume to the system. TPL proposes to develop a MEMS-based power supply for future MADM systems. The proposed effort will combine supercapacitors demonstrated in the Phase I effort with our novel micro-batteries to deliver steady-state and transient power. The supercapacitors uniquely provide high specific power (mW/mm3) enabling miniaturization of the smallest possible system. TPL's patented volumetric approach to micro-electrochemical devices maximizes energy and power densities for a given footprint, enabling a highly efficient system with minimized size and weight. This Phase II effort will demonstrate TPL's MEMS Electrochemical Power Supply (MEPS) as a solution to the neglected need for similar size power for MEMS devices. Success of this effort will enable further miniaturization enabling a new generation of low cost, high functionality, MEMS microsystems.