Smart-Clothing is a project that combines research in textiles materials and wireless sensor and actuator networks in the context of human body monitoring with statistical methods for the data analysis and treatment. This project aims mainly to aid in the monitoring of the foetal movement in the last four weeks of pregnancy. Besides the integration of sensors in the garment there will be needed a hierarchical communication system that allows the delivery of the data collected from the garment that the pregnant is wearing to the doctor. The pregnant can be either at home or in the hospital. In the first stage of the project tests are being made using several types of sensors integrated in a belt in order to choose the one that is more reliable for the detection of foetal movement. Another sensing task is the manufacture of the electrodes for the electrocardiogram (ECG) system. At this point, the electrodes for the ECG are already made and working. The testing of the sensor for the detection of foetal movement is still being done.

A irrigação subterrânea é promissora para uso em regiões com escassez de água, uma vez que a água pode ser transportada diretamente para as raízes das plantas, com pouca perda por evaporação superficial. Este trabalho apresenta como alternativa a utilização de resíduos têxteis para aplicação na agricultura propor uma solução sustentável para a destinação dos resíduos da indústria da moda que costumam ser jogados no lixo, gerando problemas ambientais. O desenvolvimento da tecnologia simples de irrigação subterrânea baseada em resíduos têxteis, aqui apresentada, levou ao uso racional da água em canteiros experimentais construídos, sem aparentes prejuízos ao desenvolvimento das lavouras, o que pode fortalecer a agricultura familiar e ter impacto significativo sobre a crescimento econômico da região, se a tecnologia for aplicada em escala. De maneira geral, todos os resultados experimentais de campo demonstraram que os dispositivos desenvolvidos com pedaços de resíduos têxteis sintéticos foram capazes de transportar água para áreas distantes do solo, mantendo-a úmida na raiz e contribuindo para um melhor crescimento das plantas testadas. Ou seja, todos os dispositivos construídos para viabilizar a irrigação subterrânea de tecidos por capilaridade funcionaram adequadamente, em uma análise qualitativa. Os dispositivos idealizados e testados têm em comum o fato de serem tecnologias de base, de baixo custo, fáceis de construir, implementar e manter; simplicidade; possibilidade de domínio da tecnologia pelos próprios beneficiários; e geradores de conhecimento compartilhado entre proponentes e beneficiários. Em suma, potenciais geradores de impacto social para essa população que tanto precisa de soluções inclusivas.

<p>Este artigo tem por objetivo comparar a eficiência de dispositivos para irrigação subterrânea de culturas de palma (<em>Opuntia ficus-indica</em>) no Brasil. Foram utilizadas duas tecnologias, a primeira consistia em um canteiro econômico revestido com uma malha dupla-face de plástico composta por tecidos planos de microfibra de poliéster e resíduos de malhas sintéticas. A segunda tecnologia consistia em baldes feitos de resíduos têxteis de microfibra e malhas sintéticas, revestidos por tela hexagonal e preparados com cimento, resíduos de brita em forma de pó e microfibras e malhas sintéticas. O desenvolvimento das culturas foi satisfatório nas duas tecnologias, contudo, a segunda exibiu melhores resultados.</p>

The problem of water scarcity has been the subject of major discussions in society and among governments. Water is a fundamental resource for the survival of living beings and is becoming increasingly scarce, with projections showing that one in four people on Earth may be suffering from extreme water scarcity by the year 2025. Irrigation is the artificial application of water to the soil in order to maintain adequate moisture for the growth of a given crop. Among the various types of irrigation, underground irrigation is promising for use in regions with water scarcity, since water can be transported directly to the plant roots, with little loss due to surface evaporation, as happens in other types of irrigation, such as sprinkling. Thus, due to this growing water scarcity and excessive use of water by agriculture, and considering the importance of irrigation for the promotion of food and nutritional security of populations, this work presents as an alternative the use of textile waste for an application in agriculture, proposing a sustainable solution for the destination of waste from the fashion industry that are usually dumped in the trash, generating environmental problems. The development of the simple technology of subterranean irrigation based on textile residues, presented here, led to the rational use of water in constructed experimental seedbeds, without apparent damage to the development of crops, which may strengthen family farming and have a significant impact on the economic growth of the region, if the technology is applied in scale. In general, all the experimental field results demonstrated that the devices developed with pieces of synthetic textile waste were able to transport water to distant areas of the soil, keeping it moist at root level and contributing to better growth of the tested plants. In other words, all the devices constructed to enable subterranean textile irrigation by capillarity worked adequately, in a qualitative analysis. The idealized and tested devices have in common the fact that they are grassroot technologies, low cost, easy to build, implement and maintain; simplicity; possibility of mastery of the technology by the beneficiaries themselves; and generators of shared knowledge between the proponents and the beneficiaries. In short, potential generators of social impact for this population that needs inclusive solutions so much.

The use of carbon filaments polymer matrix composites for strengthening of buildings might allow self-sensing of the structural health monitoring of the building structure, sensing low strains by measuring the electrical resistance of the composite. This paper analyses the change of the electrical resistivity of carbon filaments embedded in epoxy during tensile tests, concluding that their electrical resistance increases with the strain. Therefore, normal carbon tows used for strengthening the structures, as the tested ones, may behave as sensor to detect small deformations (below 1%) of the structure. Both volume electrical resistivity and contact electrical resistivity of the composite materials were analyzed, by introducing some specific and simple designs on the geometry of the filaments integrating the composite. The results may drive the development of strengthening textile fabrics with the ability of self-sensing low strains.