Cotton Transistors Advance Wearable Electronics
November 17, 2011 By
Rachel Petkewich Leave a Comment
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Researchers can make transistors from cotton with polymer coatings.
Imagine carpets that could count people walking on them. Or a T-shirt that can alert medics when a soldier has been wounded. Katherine Bourzac
reports in
New Scientist that transistors made from
polymer-coated cotton may soon make these ideas for wearable electronics into reality.
Previous attempts have not been appealing. Shirts on the market that integrate heart-rate monitors require wiring and bulky electronics boxes. Bourzac writes that ?metal and silicon ? materials typically used to build electronics ? are difficult to weave into fabric.? She adds that although conductive
polymer fibers can be woven into garment fabric, people don?t find them comfortable.
Annalisa Bonfiglio at the University of Cagliari in Italy and her colleagues figured out how to coat the cotton with gold nanoparticles and a conductive polymer, which yielded fibers with a desirable texture and feel.