Conductive polymer deposition for textile strain sensors

Body movements are an important biomedical parameter that can be measured using wearable devices. Notable applications of wearable sensors range from monitoring individuals suffering from loss of autonomy to monitoring athletes’ performance. These movements can include breathing, speech, limb motion as well as heartbeat. Accurate measurement of these movements requires precise and sensitive strain and pressure sensors. In turn, the production of these sensors requires the development of reliable, robust, and highly conductive smart materials. Conductive polymers have been used to produce flexible and stretchable sensors and are popular in flexible electronics. They are therefore excellent candidates for conductive smart materials. By the end of the internship, the student will have developed an optimized method to polymerize monomers onto textiles for their use as electronic textile. Optimization of the method would lead to upscaled production of highly reproducible and reliable conductive threads usable for strain sensors.

Faculty Supervisor:

Fabio Cicoira

Student:

Partner:

ETH Zurich

Discipline:

Life Sciences

Sector:

Education

University:

Polytechnique Montréal

Program: