Potential space applications for body-centric wireless and E-textile antennas

Abstract

Space applications of body-centric wireless and e-textile antennas are numerous. Along with the traditional data sources, such as voice, tracking, and video, new data sources including biotelemetry, high-rate video and data, detailed tracking information and status of handheld tools, devices and on-body inventories have brought about a need for increased performance from antenna systems. E-textile antennas, which typically entail lighter weights and highly conformal properties, show great potential for the next generation of space antenna systems. Antennas made from textiles, however, must be rugged and robust for use in space environments.

Wideband Antenna With Conductive Textile Radiators for a Dual-Sensor Subsurface Detection System

“…The sheet resistance specified by the manufacturer is typically and the sheet thickness is , and thus the conductivity of the textile material is , which is approximately 300 times smaller than the conductivity of . The effect of the electrical conductivity of textile material on antenna gain and field pattern has been investigated by other researchers [12], [23], [34]. In [12], [23], textile antennas made of a conductive fabric and solid copper were compared experimentally and no significant reduction in antenna performance was observed.…”

“…Aerospace applications of textile antennas and passive microwave textile components, in particular, are examined in [12], [13]. Since textile antennas are made of flexible fabric materials, the effects of antenna bending [14] and crumpling [15], [16] and moisture [17] on the antenna performance play a critical role.…”

“…The majority of the studies about textile antennas are addressed in this group, where purely textile antennas are involved. In the second group, a metallic thin Cu foil [9], [12], [14], [19], [23] is used instead of textile material as the radiator patch. In both groups, a non-conductive textile material (i.e., acrylic textile, felt fabric, fleece fabric, or cloth itself) is used as the antenna substrate.…”

Textile antenna for the multi-sensor (impulse GPR&EMI) subsurface detection system

“…Some of the important ones are textile antennas for UWB WBAN [1], Bluetooth [2] and ISM band [3,4] applications, dual-band [5 -6], dual-polarized [7] and aperture-coupled [8] textile antennas. Aerospace applications of textiles antennas and passive microwave textile components are announced in [9,10]. Because textile antennas have a flexible structure, the effects of antenna bending [11] and crumpling [12,13] on the antenna performance are also investigated.…”

High performance flexible fabric electronics for megahertz frequency communications

“…Other researchers have considered flexible antennas which are generally composed of flexible conductive patches of material [8]- [10]. The normal fabric antennas were soft and exhibit easy of bending.…”