Textiles for applications in health monitoring are becoming a major theme for the citizen’s healthcare and safety since they allow:
Societal issues such as ambulatory healthcare, isolated elderly or disabled patient’s care may be tackled by these techniques. Moreover, non-invasive and continuous monitoring of people in a critical state is more and more needed e.g. in emergency services, for heavily burnt patients and safety, e.g. exposed personnel like fire-fighters. At the present stage, health-monitoring systems using electronic textiles are mainly targeting applications based upon physiological parameter measurements, such as body movements or electro-cardiogram.
To open a dramatically wider field of applications, biochemical measurements on body fluids (blood, sweat, urine) will be needed. At the present time, biochemical analysis systems compatible with integration into clothing are unfortunately lacking. This is a major drawback for instance in the case of sweat analysis which is potentially very rich in health related information. However, such analysis is hardly performed today because of the difficulty to sample sweat in sufficient quantity. Only a real textile sensor embedded in a garment through textile techniques will allow direct collection of sweat and a large body surface; moreover lower fabrication costs are expected. For blood analysis, the main interest will be to avoid invasive sampling and to allow continuous analysis. BIOTEX aims at the development of technologies to fulfil these needs.
The BIOTEX project will develop basic technology modules and ad-hoc electronic control and analysis modules for biochemical sensing compatible with integration into sensing textile. The aim is to demonstrate the feasibility of functional biochemical sensors and their integration onto a textile substrate (“sensing patch”). Key parameters to assess will be the sensitivity, accuracy and dynamic range of measurement for each type of sensor. Three physical methods, adapted to specific measurements will be explored for sensing:
Detection methods include optics, electrochemistry and electricity (impedance monitoring). For each sensing method, the main deliverable will be a sensing patch on textile substrate. Studies for patch fabrication will include:
These patches will be qualified in terms of their sensing performance by measuring calibrated fluid models to validate their compatibility with targeted uses. They will also be assessed in terms of the textile behaviour: efficiency, reliability, durability, cutaneous tolerance and antibacterial properties.
In order to get relevant data for complex analysis, the project will ultimately deliver multi-parameter sensing patches gathering some of the developed sensing methods (e.g. a complete sweat analysis patch could combine an optical pH sensor and an electrical sweat rate sensor).
| WP | Name | Responsible |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Project management | CSEM |
| 2 | Requirements | THUASNE |
| 3 | Sensor development for patch applications | CEA-LETI |
| 4 | Textile patch fabrication: Sensor integration in a patch | SMARTEX |
| 5 | Patch electronics | CSEM |
| 6 | Patch testing | DCU |
| 7 | Multiple sensor integration | UP |
| 8 | Dissemination and exploitation | PENELOPE |
Project coordinator:
Jean Luprano
CSEM SA
Jaquet-Droz 1
CH-2007 Neuchâtel
Switzerland
T: +41 32 7205 378
F: +41 32 7205 720
