Hemp-Based Electronic Textiles for Sustainable and Wearable Applications

Abstract

While e-textiles are widely popular, their mass adoption is hindered by issues related to sustainability, reusability, and durability. Furthermore, complicated manufacturing processes and the use of toxic chemicals have exacerbated these challenges. This study presents a straightforward and scalable method for creating e-textiles using ecofriendly hemp fiber. The hemp fiber was coated with biocompatible reduced graphene oxide and polypyrrole to produce a robust and flexible electrode. The hemp e-textile was stable against different mechanical deformations, such as bending, stretching, and twisting. It was demonstrated that the electrode could be effectively used for resistive heating in wearable devices, producing the necessary heat at safe voltage levels. Additionally, when utilized as a wearable body movement tracking device, the coated hemp yarn effectively monitored finger, wrist, and elbow movements. The signal produced during movement monitoring was consistent and repeatable, indicating its suitability for practical applications. Furthermore, the hemp e-textiles exhibit exceptional durability and reusability under different environmental conditions, making them highly sustainable.

Improving durability and electrical performance of flexible printed e-textile conductors via domestic ironing

“…E-textiles research presents a pathway for combining such electronic functionality with textiles of different materials (natural/synthetic or organic/inorganic fibres) [4][5][6], structures (knitted, wovens and nonwovens, calendered, etc) [7][8][9][10][11], and surface finish [12][13][14] while preserving the inherent physical properties that made textiles desirable and versatile materials. So far, the research literature shows that e-textiles are produced by fusing a variety of functional materials such as electrically conductive films [15,16], piezoelectric films [17,18], and thermo/photochromic films [19] with the textiles using any or a combination of (a) rapid prototyping and additive manufacturing processes such as 3D printing [20], ink-jet printing [21], spray-coating [22] and dispenser printing [23] for low-throughput manufacturing, (b) microfabrication processes based on thin-film materials [24], and flexible 1D filaments/yarns [25] and, (c) traditional manufacturing processes within the textile industry (e.g.…”