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From blinking and smiling to jaw clenching and eyebrow raising, faces are constantly in motion—and generating tiny amounts of energy along the way. Now, Northwestern University engineers are putting that energy to work.

The team developed a new type of smart glasses equipped with tiny sensors that harvest mechanical energy from facial movements and convert it into electrical power. Even a quick blink or an artery's faint pulsing provides enough mechanical energy to activate the highly sensitive sensors.

To put their self-powered sensors to the test, researchers used the glasses to detect jaw clenching, teeth tapping, blinking and eyebrow raising. Not only did the glasses distinguish these movements from everyday activities like talking and eating, but they also recognized teeth tapping with 99% accuracy and jaw clenching with 96% accuracy.

The advance, called GlassTENG, could pave the way for ordinary glasses to seamlessly monitor cardiovascular health, bruxism (inadvertent jaw clenching and teeth grinding), fatigue, eating behaviors and other activities throughout the day—without bulky batteries or regular charging.

The research is published in the Proceedings of the 2026 ACM International Symposium on Wearable Computers.

"The human face is a goldmine for health data, making everyday glasses the perfect wearable," said Northwestern's Nivedita Arora, who led the work. "Generally, wearables track health data, like heart rate, through the wrist. But people have to remember to wear those trackers and take them off to recharge.

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