Insights
- A team from China and Singapore has developed a smart fibre that can emit light and generate electricity without being plugged in and may address the problems of silicon-based textile systems.
- The fibre enables wireless visual–digital interactions without the need for extra chips or batteries on textiles.
- The discovery was reported in the journal ‘Science’.
A team of researchers from Donghua University’s College of Materials Science and Engineering in Shanghai and the National University of Singapore’s Institute for Health Innovation and Technology created a smart fiber that can emit light and generate electricity without being plugged in, potentially addressing the issues with silicon-based textile systems.
Current textile electronic systems frequently use inflexible silicon components, limiting seamless integration, energy economy, and comfort. Because there are no dynamic energy-switching carriers in chipless electronic devices, digital logic difficulties persist.
The team suggested a chipless body-coupled energy interaction method for ambient electromagnetic energy harvesting and wireless signal transmission across a single fibre in the journal ‘Science’ on April 4.
The fibre itself enables wireless visual–digital interactions without the need for extra chips or batteries on textiles, the abstract of the paper in the journal said.
As all electronic assemblies are merged in a miniature fibre, it facilitates scalable fabrication and compatibility with modern weaving techniques and enables versatile and intelligent clothing.
Textiles from the fibre can realise human-computer interaction functions like luminous display and touch control without chips and batteries.
Clothes made of the new fibres can be interactive and luminous, and can also remotely control electronic products by generating unique signals for different postures of users.
“The fibres light up in response to touch because they use the human body as part of a circuit that harvests ambient electromagnetic energy. The fibres are easy to fabricate, soft, and can be made into fabric of various sizes. The authors show the potential for wireless digital interactions with a number of simple examples,” commented Brent Grocholski, senior editor for physical science at the journal.