Abstract
Wearable textile chemical sensors are promising devices due to the potential applications in medicine, sports activities and occupational safety and health. Reaching the maturity required for commercialization is a technology challenge that mainly involves material science because these sensors should be adapted to flexible and light-weight substrates to preserve the comfort of the wearer. Conductive polymers (CPs) are a fascinating solution to meet this demand, as they exhibit the mechanical properties of polymers, with an electrical conductivity typical of semiconductors. Moreover, their biocompatibility makes them promising candidates for effectively interfacing the human body. In particular, sweat analysis is very attractive to wearable technologies as perspiration is a naturally occurring process and sweat can be sampled non-invasively and continuously over time. This review discusses the role of CPs in the development of textile electrochemical sensors specifically designed for real-time sweat monitoring and the main challenges related to this topic.
Highlights
The development of wearable chemical sensors has been attracting great attention due to the huge potential applications in the fields of medicine, occupational safety, health and sports [1]
2s.wFeaabtraicnaatliyosnisoafnCdoint disuscttriuvcetuTerexdtilaesBfoalsleodwos.nFCirosntldy,uwcteivfeocPuoslyomurerasttention on the fabrication of textiles modified with Conductive polymers (CPs) and we briefly describe the scientific background concerniTnhgesfiwresat tstaenpalfyosrips.rTodheunci,nthgetetexxtitlielesechnesomrisciasl tsheensporrespbaarasteidononofCcPosndaruecctilvaessfiifliaemd ecnotnsosridteerxitnilgest.hAe stawrgiteht oanthaelyrtpeoalynmd edriisccumsasteedricaolsn,sCidPesrianrge uthseuarlolylemoifxtehdesweitmhastpereicailfiscincotmhepseonusnidnsgtmo teucnheanthisemp.hFyisnicaalllyp, rtohpeemrtiaeisnocfhthalelecnognedsuicntivtheeladyeevr.eTlohpemreefonrteo, fthteexptrileepaserantsioorns tbeacshendiqouneCs Pussuaarellyanparloydzuedce. a conductive polymer composite (CPC) because these additives remain entrapped in the film
CPs are a class of materials that could help to overcome the main limitation concerning fabrication, because they exhibit the conformability of polymers and electrical conductivity that lies in the range of semiconductors
Summary
The development of wearable chemical sensors has been attracting great attention due to the huge potential applications in the fields of medicine, occupational safety, health and sports [1]. Wearable devices must answer new constraints to be a winning technology, because besides being reliable when compared with the state-of-the-art conventional sensors, they should be designed to be as less invasive as possible, in view of reaching a wear-and-forget functionality To satisfy these requirements, the literature proposes different design strategies that are usually based on embedding the sensing element in real-life objects, such as contact lenses [3,4], tattoos [5,6,7], garments [8,9], dental appliances [10] and medical dressings [11]. The development of electrochemical textile sensors takes advantage of the recent progress in fiber and textile electronics [21] to produce conductive fabrics and yarns that will compose the device. CPs can be blended with other polymers to improve the mechanical features of the resulting CPC fibers [56]
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