Smart Fabric

In order to keep from hurting their human coworkers, many robots have sensors that detect contact with people or other objects. Scientists have now devised a high-tech sweater which brings this functionality to robots that don't have it already.

Science continues to make advances in smart fabrics. Now, a team of international researchers has created a wearable textile that can self-repair, is antibacterial, and could even be used to monitor a person’s heart rhythm.

UK researchers have created the first smart fabric that can change shape and color in response to two different stimuli: heat and electricity. The development opens up new possibilities in various fields, including virtual reality and robotics.

To develop a heat-trapping fabric, researchers looked to polar bears, who thrive in incredibly low temperatures. The secret, they found, has to do with a relationship between the bears' hollow translucent hair and the black skin that lies beneath.

While there are already garments which cool or warm their wearer via circulating liquids, those garments tend to be equipped with cumbersome, noisy pumps. An experimental new system, on the other hand, uses interwoven tubular fibers as pumps.

Most of us don't need special pants that let us know we're exhausted, but for hardcore athletes, such an alert could help stave off injuries. To that end, researchers created an electronic yarn that could detect fatigue based on movement patterns.

Whether they're patients with degenerative diseases or astronauts in weightless environments, there are some people who need to know if their muscles are wasting away. A new wearable could one day allow them to check, when and wherever they wish.

Although many groups are developing power-generating "smart fabrics," the technology is often too complex to be scaled up to commercial use. Now, however, scientists have devised a method of embroidering electrical generators onto regular fabric.

Smart textiles are usually fairly limited in size and scope. Now a team of scientists has woven together a 46-inch textile display, loaded with LEDs, sensors and energy storage, which can be made using existing industrial manufacturing processes.

When we're hot and sweaty, we prefer cool mesh-like clothing, but otherwise … mesh just doesn't keep us warm enough. A new dual-purpose fabric was designed with that conundrum in mind, as it features cooling vents that open upon absorbing sweat.

An experimental new material could help rehabilitate the injured and allow the nonspeaking to "speak," among other potential uses. It's also highly elastic, electrically conductive and self-healing – and it's known as CareGum.

Researchers at the University of California, Irvine (UCI) have developed a novel, high-tech form of fabric that foreshadows a future where items of clothing can"talk" to one another, and purchases might be made with a high-five or wave of the arm.