Analysis of Sensitivity, Linearity, Hysteresis, Responsiveness, and Fatigue of Textile Knit Stretch Sensors.

An Liang,Rebecca Stewart,Nick Bryan-Kinns

doi:10.3390/s19163618

Abstract

Wearable technology is widely used for collecting information about the human body and its movement by placing sensors on the body. This paper presents research into electronic textile strain sensors designed specifically for wearable applications which need to be lightweight, robust, and comfortable. In this paper, sixteen stretch sensors, each with different conductive stretch fabrics, are evaluated: EeonTex (Eeonyx Corporation), knitted silver-plated yarn, and knitted spun stainless steel yarn. The sensors’ performance is tested using a tensile tester while monitoring their resistance with a microcontroller. Each sensor was analyzed for its sensitivity, linearity, hysteresis, responsiveness, and fatigue through a series of dynamic and static tests. The findings show that for wearable applications a subset of the silver-plated yarn sensors had better ranked performance in terms of sensitivity, linearity, and steady state. EeonTex was found to be the most responsive, and the stainless steel yarn performed the worst, which may be due to the characteristics of the knit samples under test.

Highlights

Wearable devices have been developed to track the human body in a number of different areas, such as fitness [1], healthcare [2], entertainment [3,4], and fashion [5]
The exploration of digital textile interfaces provides the opportunity for wearable technology to be integrated into our daily lives and could provide access to data generated by the body
This study compared sixteen stretch sensors constructed from commercially available materials, evaluating metrics that best align with the desired characteristics of wearable sensors for tracking body movement

Summary

Introduction

Wearable devices have been developed to track the human body in a number of different areas, such as fitness [1], healthcare [2], entertainment [3,4], and fashion [5]. Since the 1970s and 1980s, clothing, accessories, and even the body itself were developed as an interface for various analog and digital functions by researchers [7]. The exploration of digital textile interfaces provides the opportunity for wearable technology to be integrated into our daily lives and could provide access to data generated by the body. Clothing is regarded as a second layer of skin for the human body—it keeps our body warm and protects us from the environment

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion