Electronic Textiles: An Ingredient for Impactful Innovation

Co-Author: Aditi Maheshwari
R&D Principal, Accenture Labs

HERE’S HOW LOOMIA TECH AND ACCENTURE LABS ARE BRINGING ELECTRONIC TEXTILE INNOVATIONS TO THE MAINSTREAM.  

When I first entered the world of electronic textiles (e-textiles), it was a very matrix-level phenomenon. There was not much information online regarding the technology, and there was (and still is) a widespread misconception that e-textiles are a thing of fashion and not practicality. This is something we want to challenge, and we feel it is vital to stray from this school of thought. It is not to say that e-textiles should not be used in fashionable garb, but that is not where the potential ends.

Airbus economy seat heating up with electronic textile technology

One of the first orders of business when discussing e-textiles is to define what they are, as there are several definitions out there and they are rather complex in nature. An e-textile is a circuit that is either constructed into a textile or created with the intention of being integrated into a textile-based product. Typically, they consist of either electronics or woven and printed electronics. E-textiles can provide touch, heating, and data-processing functionalities to a wide variety of application areas, and are far more robust and design-friendly than standard flexible heaters and wired systems. These wired systems are what you will find in products such as car seats and smart apparel.

Just as e-textiles can elevate everyday items, they can create new ones in areas such as health monitoring, safety, and virtual reality/augmented reality. One of my favorite application areas for e-textiles is user interfaces. When integrated into smart surfaces, they connect the human experience to the machine. Users can make their environments more adaptive to their needs, and truly feel as though they are in control. To highlight the unique capabilities of soft, touch-responsive interfaces, Accenture Labs developed a touch sensor integrated ‘smart pillow’ that can allow users to control the lights in their room simply by touching and swiping across their pillow. In another example, working with Professor Laura Devendorf at CU Boulder, Accenture Labs demonstrated a smart textile installation called “A Fabric that Remembers” that uniquely expresses the textile’s ability to ‘remember’ how it has been interacted with. This piece is a tapestry-style wall fixture with six integrated force sensors that measure how hard it is being pressed in six different locations, and allows us to computationally “see” the touch in real-time.

Figure1: “A Fabric that Remembers” displayed at Accenture Labs, San Francisco.
Picture Credits: Unstable Design Lab, CU Boulder

Telehealth is on the rise due to COVID, and e-textiles could do quite a bit of good in this area. Say you have a patient in a low-income community who may not have convenient access to a medical facility. Their condition can be monitored wherever they are thanks to e-textiles and wearable technology. It has also been found that elevated temperatures can kill coronaviruses. Back in 2003, SARS Coronavirus was found to be non-infectious after heat at 56C (132F) was applied for 90 minutes. Incorporating this technology into medical wearables could prove not only to be game changing, but lifesaving. Another way that e-textiles can revolutionize public health safety is by enabling self-cleaning surfaces. Last year, Accenture Labs developed a self-cleaning and de-staining textile technology that can be used in automotive or theater seating to prevent the spread of diseases through high-touch surfaces in public places. By embedding visible light LEDs directly in the fabric and using them to activate a nanocoating on the fabric surface, the team developed a smart fabric that cleans itself by destroying all organic contaminants on its surface - from food stains to disease-causing bacteria.

The lifesaving potential of e-textiles extends beyond healthcare to safety applications. Particularly, occupation safety. One such application is construction wearables. LEDs can be added to uniforms and turn on automatically when a lack of adequate lighting is detected.

Figure 2: Visible light-induced destaining after 24 hrs exposure to 2365 lux light. Source: ACM Digital Library

In our increasingly digital world, we are seeing a rise in virtual and augmented reality. E-textiles can make VR and AR devices more lightweight, flexible, and portable. Instead of a bulky headset, we may be able to control our environment from a shirt sleeve. Textile-based VR/AR devices are not new, and the technology has already been explored by research scientists at Hong Kong Polytechnic University. The researchers have even developed a stretchable conductor that could be used for this exact purpose.  

E-textiles also hold a lot of promise in transforming how our everyday devices and wearables are powered. As an example, Accenture Labs and Drexel University are integrating MXene-based textile supercapacitor yarns into fabrics to do away with the hard and bulky electronics needed to power textile wearables. These MXene yarns can store energy directly in the fabric, and can be combined with textile sensing and energy harvesting systems to create fully textile-based wearables that are more sustainable, safe, and comfortable for long-term wear.   

Another area I am excited to see e-textiles utilized in is robotics. The Loomia Electronic Layer (LEL) technology has been used in the FESTO Bionic Mobile Assistant, giving the robotic hand a sense of touch. The Bionic Mobile Assistant can recognize objects, grip adaptively, and work together with humans to complete tasks. The beauty of robotics, soft robotics specifically, is in the problems they can solve. For example, in post-operative medical devices. They can be a major time saver in minimally invasive surgeries, and can be programmed to mimic human motion; acting as a great assistant to surgeons.  

One of the main concerns with integrating e-textiles into products is the cost. Also, many e-textiles consist of non-recurring engineering; this means they are typically only made for use in one product. For e-textiles to become more widely utilized, they need to be made affordable, replicable, scalable, and easy to integrate. This can be done as digital fabrication technologies advance, and the cost of electronic components decreases.

E-textiles will one day be at the core of product design, as bold as that statement may be. They will undoubtedly become a foundational technology in our cars, homes, wardrobes, and public spaces. They will facilitate our daily routines and cater to our needs. Dare I say, e-textiles are the future and will change our world for the better.