Abstract
This paper presents a textile-based stretchable microstrip patch antenna with intrinsic strain for e-textiles with seamlessly integrated multifunctional devices. Several microstrip antennas have been developed with the patch alone (stretchable up to 40%) or both the patch and the ground plane (stretchable up to 100%) meshed by using rectangular serpentine units. The changes in the resonant frequency of the meshed antennas, as a result of stretching, have been exploited to demonstrate the intrinsic uniaxial strain sensing. The obtained results indicate that resonant frequency decreases linearly with increasing applied strain, suggesting that the designed antennas can also be used as strain sensors with stretchability up to 100% and a sensitivity of 0.25. The results were validated through full-wave electromagnetic simulations and a two-dimensional digital image correlation (DIC) technique to model the antenna deformations during the tensile tests. In terms of stretchability, the meshed textile patch antenna on a solid ground plane showed more than a 2-fold improvement compared to a meshed gold patch antenna, showing a linear frequency shift. As potential applications, we demonstrate the use of a highly deformable fully meshed textile antenna as a strain sensor capable of measuring joint angles of a human limb. To do that, a microwave readout circuit based on RF to DC rectifier was realized. The rectifier obtained a peak conversion efficiency of 71% at 10 dBm input power overload resistor of 3 kΩ.
Highlights
IntroductionThe wiring required to acquire the data is prone to damage, for example, during bending in wearable systems, and may lead to interferences between parallel signals as well as time delays.[9] Likewise, the increasing number of devices raises integration challenges, in addition to traditional challenges such as higher cost and power requirements
The increasing use of wearable systems for wellness and health monitoring applications has directed the attention of researchers toward wireless sensor networks (WSNs) and body sensor networks (BSNs) for real-time measurement of physiological parameters such as heart rate, body temperature, strain, body motions, and so on.[1−5] Some of these wireless sensors find application in humanoid robotics, prosthetics, and human−machine interactions, to address the issue of wiring complexity.[6−8] The flexibility and conformability of more and more functional devices have been the trend in recent years to meet the key requirements of these applications
The change in the response carries the signature of deformation, which reflects the potential route for using the antenna as a strain sensor and a way to decrease the number of components without sacrificing the functionality or increasing the integration challenges
Summary
The wiring required to acquire the data is prone to damage, for example, during bending in wearable systems, and may lead to interferences between parallel signals as well as time delays.[9] Likewise, the increasing number of devices raises integration challenges, in addition to traditional challenges such as higher cost and power requirements Considering these challenges, a system with a similar level of functionality (as with a large number of nodes and sensors) and yet less complexity is much needed. The work presented in this paper demonstrates such a multifunctional antenna realized with stretchable conductive textile
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