Abstract
Rapid growth of personal electronics with concurrent research into telerehabilitation solutions discovers opportunities to redefine the future of orthopedic rehabilitation. After joint injury or operation, convalescence includes free active range of movement exercises, such as joints bending and straightening under medical supervision. Flexion detection through wearable textile sensors provides numerous potential benefits such as: (1) reduced cost; (2) continuous monitoring; (3) remote telerehabilitation; (4) gamification; and (5) detection of risk-inducing activities in daily routine. To address this issue, novel piezoresistive multi-walled carbon nanotubes/graphite/styrene–butadiene–styrene copolymer (CNT/Gr/SBS) fiber was developed. The extrusion process allowed adjustable diameter fiber production, while being a scalable, industrially adapted method of manufacturing textile electronics. Composite fibers were highly stretchable, withstanding strains up to 285%, and exhibited exceptional piezoresistive parameters with a gauge factor of 91.64 for 0–100% strain range and 2955 for the full scope. Considering the composite’s flexibility and sensitivity during a series of cyclic loading, it was concluded that developed Gr/CNT/SBS fibers were suitable for application in wearable piezoresistive sensors for telerehabilitation application.
Highlights
Extruded carbon-SBS fibers were highly elastic, which allowed for their storage in coils.1.Composites containing carbon black inFCNT
The extrusion process proved to be a suitable method for producing piezoresistive The extrusion process proved to be a suitable method for producing piezoresistive composite fibers
Each composite was subjected to an extrusion process fibers were selected for further investigation—FCNT, FGr, FM1, and FMTensile tests renozzles of 1 mm, 0.5 mm, and 0.2 mm in diameter
Summary
Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Professional observation, whenever possible, the patient could perform the exercises independently with feedback from the wearable flexion sensor This could greatly improve the rehabilitation process, reducing the necessary time of medical supervision. Conventional metal strain gauges and extensometers fail to meet the requirements posed by capturing the garment elongation associated with joint flexion Their gauge factor at ~2% and 5% of maximal strain [6] are insufficient for wearable sensor applications. To meet the requirements posed by flexible, stretchable textronic sensors, substantial research has been devoted to the development of elastic conductive polymers composites (elastic CPCs). The application of screen printing and heat transfer printing has been reported [60,61,62] These manufacturing methods enable large-format, scalable, time-efficient production of sensors firmly embedded in the textile fibers of the substrate. With their high flexibility and small diameter, the fibers can be integrated as textronics strain gauges by knitting directly onto the garment
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