Smart Textiles for Visible and IR Camouflage Application: State-of-the-Art and Microfabrication Path Forward

Abstract

Protective textiles used for military applications must fulfill a variety of functional requirements, including durability, resistance to environmental conditions and ballistic threats, all while being comfortable and lightweight. In addition, these textiles must provide camouflage and concealment under various environmental conditions and, thus, a range of wavelengths on the electromagnetic spectrum. Similar requirements may exist for other applications, for instance hunting. With improvements in infrared sensing technology, the focus of protective textile research and development has shifted solely from providing visible camouflage to providing camouflage in the infrared (IR) region. Smart textiles, which can monitor and react to the textile wearer or environmental stimuli, have been applied to protective textiles to improve camouflage in the IR spectral range. This study presents a review of current smart textile technologies for visible and IR signature control of protective textiles, including coloration techniques, chromic materials, conductive polymers, and phase change materials. We propose novel fabrication technology combinations using various microfabrication techniques (e.g., three-dimensional (3D) printing; microfluidics; machine learning) to improve the visible and IR signature management of protective textiles and discuss possible challenges in terms of compatibility with the different textile performance requirements.

Upcycling agro-industrial blueberry waste into platform chemicals and structured materials for application in marine environments

“…† The results suggested that it is possible to manufacture surfaces and textile fabrics with low gloss (less than 10%) and low reflectance (R b < 3), independent of the lignin content. These properties (low gloss and radiance) are essential for textile camouflage, 79 thermal protective clothing, 80 and thermal energy textiles using phase change materials. 81 The high stretchability of the filaments under wet conditions encouraged us to test LCF for underwater applications in marine environments.…”

Applications of Smart Clothing – a Brief Overview

“…Another area of application for intelligent textiles is military clothing, in which the health status of soldiers is continuously monitored. Integrated sensors in the helmet and a comprehensive vital sign system register the person's position and movement as well as heart and breathing rates [78]. In addition, the fluid intake, skin temperature measurement and sleep behavior are constantly checked and displayed on the monitor.…”

Design of micro‐ and macro‐scale polymeric metamaterial solutions for passive and active thermal camouflaging applications

“…Building on past works, the focus of this study is to develop predictive models using COMSOL Multiphysics [ 30 ] to inform design decisions when manufacturing polyethylene (PE)‐based micro‐ and macro‐scale metamaterials for passive and active thermal camouflaging applications within the MIR wavelength (5–16 µm). PE is the polymer of choice for this study due to its low emissive properties, [ 29,31,32 ] ability to be woven into fibers for smart textile applications, [ 33 ] elastic durability, [ 34 ] and high IR transparency. [ 35 ] For the first time in the literature: (1) PE‐based patterned metamaterials (specifically, micro‐ and macro‐scale designs) for passive and active thermal management solutions are proposed, (2) a lenticular lens macro‐scale design in various configurations (e.g., single‐layered and multi‐layered systems) is explored for efficient thermal management, (3) active solutions to thermal radiation control are introduced where elastic properties of PE are used to dynamically change the geometrical aspect ratio of the unit cells of metamaterials, and (4) preferable configurations for micro‐scale post design (post height, width, and spacing) are proposed.…”

“…Building on past works, the focus of this study is to develop predictive models using COMSOL Multiphysics [30] to inform design decisions when manufacturing polyethylene (PE)-based micro-and macro-scale metamaterials for passive and active thermal camouflaging applications within the MIR wavelength (5-16 µm). PE is the polymer of choice for this study due to its low emissive properties, [29,31,32] ability to be woven into fibers for smart textile applications, [33] elastic durability, [34] and high IR transparency. [35] For the first time in the literature:…”