Rugged Textile Electrodes for Wearable Devices Obtained by Vapor Coating Off‐the‐Shelf, Plain‐Woven Fabrics

Fabrics are pliable, breathable, lightweight, ambient stable, and have unmatched haptic perception. Here, a vapor deposition method is used to transform off‐the‐shelf plain‐woven fabrics, such as linen, silk, and bast fiber fabrics, into metal‐free conducting electrodes. These fabric electrodes are...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Advanced functional materials 2017-06, Vol.27 (24), p.n/a
Main Authors: Zhang, Lushuai, Fairbanks, Marianne, Andrew, Trisha L.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Clothing industry
Coated electrodes
conducting polymers
Devices
Drawing and ironing
Electrodes
Flexibility
Garments
Linen
Materials science
Porosity
Silk
vapor coatings
Vapor deposition
Washing
Wear resistance
wearable electronics
Wearable technology
Woven fabrics
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Summary:Fabrics are pliable, breathable, lightweight, ambient stable, and have unmatched haptic perception. Here, a vapor deposition method is used to transform off‐the‐shelf plain‐woven fabrics, such as linen, silk, and bast fiber fabrics, into metal‐free conducting electrodes. These fabric electrodes are resistant to wear, stable after laundering and ironing, and can be body‐mounted with little detriment to their performance. A unique by‐product of conformally vapor coating plain‐woven fabrics is that textile parameters, such as thread material and fabric porosity, significantly affect the conductivity of the resulting fabric electrodes. The resistivities of the electrodes reported herein are linearly, not exponentially, dependent on length, meaning that they can be feasibly incorporated into garments and other large‐area body‐mounted devices. Further, these fabric electrodes possess the feel, weight, breathability, and pliability of standard fabrics, which are important to enable adoption of wearable devices. Vapor deposition is used to imperceptibly transform off‐the‐shelf plain‐woven fabrics, such as linen, silk, and bast fiber fabrics, into metal‐free conducting electrodes. The electrical conductivity of these electrodes remains unchanged upon bending, folding, and after laundering or ironing. These fabric electrodes also possess the feel, weight, breathability, and pliability of standard fabrics.
ISSN:1616-301X
1616-3028
DOI:10.1002/adfm.201700415