According to foreign media reports, Rice University researchers recently demonstrated a clothing with carbon nanotubes that can continuously monitor the wearer's heart. There's no need to wear an uncomfortable smartwatch or chest strap to monitor your heart if your comfortable clothing does a better job. That's the idea behind "smart clothing" developed by a Rice University lab that uses its conductive nanowires to weave functionality into regular clothing.
Matteo Pasquali, a chemical and biomolecular engineer at the school's Brown School of Engineering, reports in Nano Letters, a journal of the American Chemical Society, that it sewn nanotube fibers into sportswear to monitor heart rate and perform continuous electrocardiographic monitoring of the wearer. .
Prema istraživačima, vlakna su vodljiva poput metalnih žica, ali su periva, udobna i mnogo je manje vjerojatno da će puknuti kada je tijelo u pokretu. Općenito, njihova poboljšana odjeća bila je bolja u prikupljanju podataka od standardnih{0}}monitora na prsima koji su u eksperimentima vršili mjerenja na terenu. Kada se usporede s komercijalnim monitorima medicinskih elektroda, odjevni predmeti od ugljičnih nanocijev su bili nešto bolji na EKG-ima.
"The garment had to fit snugly against the chest," said Rice graduate student Lauren Taylor, lead author of the study. "In future research, we will focus on using denser blocks of carbon nanowires so that there is more surface area to contact the skin."
Istraživači ističu da su vlakna nanocijevi mekana i elastična, a odjeća koja ih sadrži može se prati u perilici. Ova se vlakna mogu strojno šivati na tkaninu kao standardni konac. Uzorak cik-cak šavova omogućuje da se tkanine rastežu bez pucanja.
The fibers not only provide a stable electrical contact with the wearer's skin, Taylor said, but also act as electrodes to connect electronic devices such as Bluetooth transmitters, relay data to smartphones, or connect to Holter monitors that can fit in the user's pocket. device.
Pasquali's lab introduced carbon nanotube fibers in 2013. Since then, fibers containing tens of billions of nanotubes each have been studied to repair bridges in damaged hearts, as electrical interfaces to the brain, for cochlear implants, as flexible antennas, and for automotive and aerospace applications. Their development is also part of the Rice-based Carbon Center, a multi-university research initiative led by Rice and launched in 2019.
Izvorni filamenti nanocijevi bili su široki oko 22 mikrona, pretanki za šivaći stroj. Za izradu niti za šivanje korišten je stroj za izradu užeta, u osnovi tri snopa od po sedam filamenata, tkanih otprilike iste veličine kao obični konac, rekao je Taylor.
"We worked with a guy who sold a little machine designed to make ropes for model boats," says Taylor, who initially tried to weave the thread by hand with limited success. "He was able to make us a mid-scale device that could do that."
Cik{0}}uzorak se može podesiti tako da se uzme u obzir koliko rastezljiva sportska odjeća ili druga tkanina, rekla je. Taylor je rekao da tim radi s dr. Mehdijem Razavijem i njegovim kolegama s Texas Heart Institute kako bi otkrili kako maksimizirati kontakt s kožom.
Vlakna utkana u tkaninu također bi se mogla koristiti za ugradnju antena ili LED dioda, rekli su istraživači. Male izmjene geometrije vlakana i povezane elektronike mogle bi na kraju omogućiti odjeći da prati vitalne znakove, napor ili brzinu disanja.
Other potential uses could include human-machine interfaces in cars or soft robots, or as antennas, health monitors and bulletproof protection for military uniforms, Taylor noted. "We demonstrated with a collaborator a few years ago that carbon nanotube fibers dissipate energy better per unit weight than Kevlar fibers, and that's without some of our later progress in tensile strength," she said. "
"We're seeing this material play a role in more and more applications after 20 years of development in laboratories around the world," Pasquali said. "Carbon nanotubes are a natural building block for wearable devices due to their combination of electrical conductivity, good skin contact, biocompatibility and softness."
Tržište nosivih proizvoda, iako je relativno malo, moglo bi biti ulazna točka za novu generaciju održivih materijala koji se mogu ekstrahirati iz ugljikovodika izravnim cijepanjem, procesom koji također proizvodi čisti vodik, rekao je. Razvoj ovog materijala fokus je Carbon Centra.
"We are in the same situation as solar cells were decades ago," Pasquali said. "We need application leaders that can power scale-up of production and improve efficiency."
