Heralding The Era Of Electronic Textile [Smart Garment]

Science and technology can never cease to amaze us. We’ve seen amazing inventions in the area of emerging tech; but now we’ll be looking at E-textile.

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E-textile (also called Smart garment) is a kind of garment that is incorporated with electronic components, most of which can detect changes in the environment, and also respond in a pre-programmed way (it could be through giving off sound, EM waves, or light). Most of these E-textiles conduct electricity.

The primary aim of developing this kind of fabric is to provide additional value to the wearer which traditional garments do not provide. In a layman’s term, the cloth interacts with the wearer.

This revolution was heralded by many researchers. One of them is the respected Professor Rebeccah pailes-Friedman (from Pratt institute). She has also proposed the future of E-textile that has the ability to grow. Impressive, isn’t it?

The potentials in the E-textile tech are limitless. The future could see E-garments coming with amazing properties like; perfumes, moisturizers, and even anti-aging properties. - Prof Rebeccah Pailes-Friedman [paraphrased by me]

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Categories of E-textile

E-textile is basically categorized into two:

1. Aesthetic E-textile: This includes the kind of E-textile that is majorly used for fashion. Like; light-emitting fabric, colour-changing fabric. This kind can also harness energy and vibrations from the surrounding environment and uses it to respond to changes.
2. Performance Enhancing E-textile: The purpose of this is to give the wearer an added ability or an edge over his natural ability. For example; it could give athletes some boosts, shield space travelers from radiation, protect against extreme weather condition, and guard against hazardous condition.

Note: E-textile is dissimilar from wearable computer, and must not be confused with it

This is because; E-textile comes with an incorporation of fabrics with electronic components (sensors and microcontrollers) seamlessly.

Sensory in E-textile

Though this E-textile is made from either polyester, cotton, Kevlar, or any other traditional fabric, what qualifies it as E-textile is the sensory unit embedded into it. This sensory unit can be seen as “Wearable Motherboard”. And this can interconnect the entire sensors in the material.

Advances are underway to power the E-textile entirely from the changes in the environment, which includes the heat emitted by the body of the wearer. – Prof Rebeccah [Paraphrased by me]

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Fibretronics

Just like the normal electronics, the design of E-textile requires the use of conductors and semiconductors. Most astonishingly, some of these textiles come with pre-installed metallic fibres, which are woven within the normal fibres.

But as advances are being made, the option of metallic fibres is being ruled off. A new type of organic electronics material has arisen. This is designed as inks or ultra-light plastic. With this kind of electronic material, the E-textile can be washed. I know this question may have dropped in your heart; “can this E-textile be washed?” Well, organic electronic material is the answer to this question.

Potential applications of E-textile

• Can be used to monitor the wearer’s vitals (heartbeat, pulse rate, temperature, etc).
• Used in the military to track the location of soldiers.
• Sports enhancements

The applications are almost limitless. Tech can only get better.

Tech Rules!!

References for further reading: Ref1, Ref2, Ref3