Smart Clothes Essay

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Introduction Smart clothing, also known as E-textile, is wearable clothes which consist of embedded electronic or computing devices. It is not literally a computing device that is fixed into the fabric but emphasis is given on seamless integration of fabric and electronic elements like cables, microchips etc. The field of studying on smart clothing is occasionally called fibretronics. This paper introduces the field of smart clothing and discusses the history of smart clothes in relation to their stages of development to understand the topic. Furthermore, the paper presents the technology behind smart clothing under the categories interface technologies, communication, data management, energy management and integrated circuits. The types of materials been used in the manufacture of smart clothes are also discussed. All the above mentioned particulars are discussed with a few examples like firefighter clothing, military clothing etc. The paper concludes giving an insight into the future of smart clothes and a brief description on applying nanotechnology to smart clothes. The History of Smart Clothes Smart clothes originated in The United States and European countries during 1990’s for military, sports and medical purposes. Smart clothes can be categorized into 4 different stages according to their technological advancement. The development of wearable computers during 1980 to 1997, also known as the first stage, initiated the concept of smart clothing. These first stage projects mainly focused on making computing hardware into portable devices. In this stage fabrics acted only as a surface to electronic devices. Products of this stage were not actually wearable but they were portable. The second stage (1998 to 2001) is marked by the development of products supported by fashion and textile companies. During 1999s, Phillips Electronics and Levis companies produced

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