A non-printed integrated-circuit textile for wireless theranostics

• Published in: Nature communications Vol. 12; no. 1; p. 4876
• Main Authors: Yang, Yuxin, Wei, Xiaofei, Zhang, Nannan, Zheng, Juanjuan, Chen, Xing, Wen, Qian, Luo, Xinxin, Lee, Chong-Yew, Liu, Xiaohong, Zhang, Xingcai, Chen, Jun, Tao, Changyuan, Zhang, Wei, Fan, Xing
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Nature Publishing Group UK 12-08-2021; Nature Publishing Group; Nature Portfolio
• Subjects: 639/301/1005/1009; 639/925/927/59; Alkalosis; Biosensing Techniques - instrumentation; Biosensing Techniques - methods; Circuit boards; Circuits; Computers; COVID-19; COVID-19 - diagnosis; COVID-19 - prevention & control; COVID-19 - virology; Diabetes mellitus; Electrochemistry; Electronic circuits; Electronics; Emergencies; Equipment Design; Fibers; Formability; Gating; Humanities and Social Sciences; Humans; Hypoglycemia; Integrated circuits; Medical electronics; Monitoring, Physiologic - instrumentation; Monitoring, Physiologic - methods; multidisciplinary; Power consumption; Power management; Precision medicine; Precision Medicine - instrumentation; Precision Medicine - methods; Printed circuit boards; Printed circuits; SARS-CoV-2 - physiology; Science; Science (multidisciplinary); Sensors; Sweat - physiology; Textiles; Transistors; Wearable Electronic Devices; Wearable technology; Wireless Technology - instrumentation
• ISSN: 2041-1723; 2041-1723
• DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-25075-8

While the printed circuit board (PCB) has been widely considered as the building block of integrated electronics, the world is switching to pursue new ways of merging integrated electronic circuits with textiles to create flexible and wearable devices. Herein, as an alternative for PCB, we described a non-printed integrated-circuit textile (NIT) for biomedical and theranostic application via a weaving method. All the devices are built as fibers or interlaced nodes and woven into a deformable textile integrated circuit. Built on an electrochemical gating principle, the fiber-woven-type transistors exhibit superior bending or stretching robustness, and were woven as a textile logical computing module to distinguish different emergencies. A fiber-type sweat sensor was woven with strain and light sensors fibers for simultaneously monitoring body health and the environment. With a photo-rechargeable energy textile based on a detailed power consumption analysis, the woven circuit textile is completely self-powered and capable of both wireless biomedical monitoring and early warning. The NIT could be used as a 24/7 private AI “nurse” for routine healthcare, diabetes monitoring, or emergencies such as hypoglycemia, metabolic alkalosis, and even COVID-19 patient care, a potential future on-body AI hardware and possibly a forerunner to fabric-like computers.
The typical approach to electronics is to integrate sensors, power units, and controlling components on a printed circuit board (PCB). Here, the authors demonstrate a self-powered and fully integrated combination of sensors and controlling components that is woven, rather than integrated onto a PCB, allowing for wearable health monitoring.”