Fully Woven Smart Display

 Scientists Develop Fully Woven Smart Display

University of Cambridge (U.K.), February 10, 2022

An international team of researchers led by the U.K.'s University of Cambridge has fabricated a fully woven prototype smart textile display with active electronic, sensing, energy, and photonic functions incorporated directly into the weave. The researchers coated each fiber element with materials that are sufficiently elastic for textile-manufacturing equipment, and braided some of them for better reliability and durability. They also linked multiple components together via conductive adhesives and laser welding. The resulting fabric can function as a display, monitor inputs, retain energy for later use, and detect radio-frequency signals, touch, light, and temperature. Said Cambridge’s Jong min Kim, “This is a step towards the full exploitation of sustainable, convenient e-fibers and e-textiles in daily applications. And it’s only the beginning.”

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Inobtrusive Wearables Monitoring Health

Interesting out of Purdue, where we connected in the retail modeling world.  Here it seems novel methods of self powering.    We called it 'smart clothing'.   Got a call from marketing execs about washing such clothing.  An internet of Togs? 

Forget Wearables: Future Washable Smart Clothes Powered by Wi-Fi Will Monitor Your Health  By Purdue University Research Foundation News

Purdue University engineers have developed a technique to turn apparel into washable smart clothes that operate without batteries, by drawing power wirelessly.

Purdue's Ramses Martinez said the method involves spray-coating the clothes with hydrophobic molecules to repel water, oil, and mud, while electronic components are sewn onto their surfaces.

The circuitry captures ambient Wi-Fi or radio waves, and converts them to electricity to power the clothes.

Said Martinez, "I envision smart clothes will be able to transmit information about the posture and motion of the wearer to mobile apps, allowing machines to understand human intent without the need of other interfaces, expanding the way we communicate, interact with devices, and play video games."

From Purdue University Research Foundation News

Digital Clothes

 Because the company I worked for is one of the largest manufacturer of detergents, we got lots of questions about the future of the design, use, manufacture and care of clothing.   Got the feeling that none of this ever went anywhere, but perhaps now?  Covered it loosely over the years.  Still wonder about the 'wild' aspect, but good overview here.

 The clothes we wear are about to undergo a wild digital revolution  By Jared Lindzon in FastCompany

The way clothing gets made has changed surprisingly little over the years. But new advances are adding intelligence and customization to the process.

Imagine an article of clothing that could tell your washing machine how to keep its colors from fading. Imagine a piece of clothing that could warm your body in the winter and cool it down in the summer. Imagine wearing clothes that weren’t designed last year, or last season, but yesterday, in response to that day’s buying patterns. Imagine being able to fully customize every article of clothing in your wardrobe for the same cost as mass-produced items.  ... ' 

Printing Quasi Textiles

 Had not heard of this before ... had examined how 'smart' fabrics would need to be maintained.   Intriguing direction.   Quasi textiles.

Leveraging a 3D Printer 'Defect' to Create a Quasi-Textile

MIT News  By Becky Ham

A graduate student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Jack Forman, created a tulle-like textile by controlling a common defect in three-dimensional (3D) printers. DefeXtiles are based on an under-extruding process developed by Forman called "glob-stretch," in which globs of thermoplastic polymer are connected by fine strands, producing a flexible and stretchy textile very similar to a woven fabric. The new textile, created using a standard $250 3D printer, can be sewn, de-pleated, and heat-bonded. Said Forman, "This is exciting because there's a lot of opportunities with 3D printing fabric, but it's really hard for it to be easily disseminated, since a lot of it uses expensive machinery and special software or special commands that are generally specific to a printer."

Chinese Intelligent Uniforms

Apparently in test.

Chinese schools keep tabs on kids with 'intelligent uniforms'
All in all, you're just another chip in the wall. .... "

By Jon Fingas, @jonfingas in Engadget

Jacquard Devices

Notes on new ways to place wearable, immersive computing. Well beyond the loom. 

Jaquard Device Turns Houseplants into Keyboards in Ideaconnection
Designer Ivan Poupyrev discusses his Jacquard device, which can turn everyday objects into computers.  ...

And Levi considers the Jacquard wearable
As a company of firsts, Levi’s has spent over 150 years innovating fashionable, functional clothing. The Jacquard vision centers around expanding the functionality of the clothes people already wear and love. And that’s exactly what we did with Levi’s in creating the Commuter Trucker Jacket with Jacquard by Google woven in. ... "

Is this anywhere today?

Smart Textiles

We examined options for smart textile cleansing

Graphene Unlocks New Potential for 'Smart Textiles'  by University of Exeter

An international engineering team led by the University of Exeter in the U.K. has pioneered a new method to create fully electronic fibers that can be embedded into the production of everyday apparel to enable "smart textiles." The method involves coating the fibers with lightweight, durable components to allow the direct display of images on the fabric. The engineers employed existing polypropylene fibers to affix graphene-based electronic fibers and create touch-sensor and light-emitting devices. Said Exeter's Ana Neves, "The key to this new technique is that the textile fibers are flexible, comfortable, and light, while being durable enough to cope with the demands of modern life." According to the researchers, this development could revolutionize the fabrication of wearable electronic devices for a wide range of everyday applications, as well as health monitoring and medical diagnostics. ...  "

How to Store Information in Your Clothes

Quite remarkable idea, ready to test this out before buying more storage devices.

How to Store Information in Your Clothes Invisibly, Without Electronics
By University of Washington 

A new type of smart fabric developed at the University of Washington could pave the way for jackets that store invisible passcodes and open the door to your apartment or office.

The UW computer scientists have created fabrics and fashion accessories that can store data — from security codes to identification tags — without needing any on-board electronics or sensors.

As described in "Data Storage and Interaction Using Magnetized Fabric," presented at UIST 2017, the ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology, the researchers leveraged previously unexplored magnetic properties of off-the-shelf conductive thread. The data can be read using an instrument embedded in existing smartphones to enable navigation apps.

"This is a completely electronic-free design, which means you can iron the smart fabric or put it in the washer and dryer," says senior author Shyam Gollakota, associate professor in the Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science & Engineering. "You can think of the fabric as a hard disk — you're actually doing this data storage on the clothes you're wearing."     ..... " 

Kinetic Jewelry

MIT's new 'living' jewelry are creepy robot beetles for your clothes

Not fashion meets function yet    by Dani Deahl    @danideahl 

Last year, MIT and Stanford debuted a new type of robot that could crawl over the surface of your clothing with the use of magnets. Now, it appears to have gone high fashion. It’s no longer a “rovable,” it’s Project Kino (kinetic wearables). .... 

Textile Muscles

Textile Muscles Could Power Clothing

Textile Muscles Could Power Clothing ...   In IdeaConnection.
Textile muscles made of flexible polymers could open the door to powered clothing able to provide a muscular boost when needed.

Developed by teams at Linköping University and the University of Borås, the artificial muscles are made from cellulose yarns that have been coated with a flexible, electrically conductive polymer. Applying a current to the polymer will trigger it to flex, and altering the style of the weave will cause the material to react in different ways. 

The team believes the soft muscles could be used to create assistive clothing that comfortably conceals its real purpose. .... " 

Smart Shirts for First Responders

U.S. backs research into smart shirts for emergency responders  by Donal Power

The U.S. government is funding an Internet of Things (IoT) project that is developing sensor-based smart shirts for first responders.

Fed Tech Magazine reports that the Department of Homeland Security is bankrolling research into wearables that can track the health of firefighters and other emergency crew in near real-time. ... " 

Cooling Your Clothing

 In IEEE Spectrum.

High Tech Material Will Make Clothes Cool So You Don't Need AC
Although developing more power-efficient air conditioners and building greener homes and offices can help cut energy costs and reduce pollution, finding ways to live and work without air conditioners might have an even larger impact. That's especially true in light of the fact that in countries like India, which have growing middle classes, the total power consumption for air conditioning is projected to climb by an order of magnitude over the coming decade. To lessen the demand for cool air, researchers from the University of California at San Diego are developing a smart fabric capable of helping the wearer maintain a comfortable body temperature. ... " 

Building Robotic Pants

In CACM:
Scientists at the University of Bristol have developed robotic pants with built-in artificial muscles designed to aid the elderly or people with disabilities.

The soft robotic clothing gives users added strength and balance to prevent falls and let them move around more easily. The material also can give users bionic strength, helping them stand up, climb stairs, and walk more steadily. ... " 

Google and Levis Team up for Smart Clothes.

Not a new idea, but once you have conductive yarn ...   Examined some years ago, where it included flashing displays. I was asked by the detergent folks how it might be cleansed.

" ... Your jacket or pants could soon control your phone or home security
Google executives have a vision that one day soon your jacket, shirt, pants -- even your socks -- might control your phone, tablet or even the lights in your house.   ...  "

Robotic Fabrics for Active Clothing

Out of Purdue University, new developments.  Robotics need not be standalone, they can combine with  us in surprising ways.

Robotic fabric could bring 'active clothing,' wearable robots

Researchers are developing a robotic fabric that moves and contracts and is embedded with sensors, an approach that could bring "active clothing" and a new class of "soft" robots.

Such an elastic technology could make possible robots that have sensory skin, stretchable robotic garments that people might wear for added strength and endurance, "g-suits" for pilots or astronauts to counteract the effects of acceleration, and lightweight, versatile robots to roam alien landscapes during space missions.

The robotic fabric is a cotton material containing sensors made of a flexible polymer and threadlike strands of a shape-memory alloy that return to a coiled shape when heated, causing the fabric to move.

"We have integrated both actuation and sensing, whereas most robotic fabrics currently in development feature only sensing or other electronic components that utilize conductive thread," said Rebecca Kramer, an assistant professor of mechanical engineering at Purdue University. "We also use standard sewing techniques to introduce the thread-like actuators and sensors into the fabric, so they could conceivably be integrated into the existing textile manufacturing infrastructure."   ... ' 

Smart Textiles

In ComputingNow:  A topic we explored, being a garment care industry, but have not heard much about recently:

" ... Current technology supports only special-purpose, low-volume textiles, garments, and electronics. Moreover, the textile, electronic, and software industries have different product cycles, cultures, and price models, creating scores of practical problems for smart textiles. Mass producing smart cloth will require decoupling the textile production from concrete sensing apps and moving the complexity to generic electronics and software—creating wearable sensing as an app.

As with many new technologies, smart clothing and textile electronics currently suffer from the chicken-and-egg problem—that is, for the devices to be widely deployed, the price must come down, but for the price to come down, the devices must be mass-produced (widely deployed). A core issue is that there's still no killer app for smart textiles that lets developers produce numerous identical (from the sensing viewpoint) garments. Instead, there are many potential apps with different sensing requirements. ... "