Intelligent Clothing
Virginia Tech professors Tom Martin and Mark Jones have spent the past six years developing electronic textiles and clothing with embedded wires and sensors. One such piece of clothing is a suit that can monitor the movement of the person wearing it, including whether the person is walking, running, standing, or sitting. “One student could even figure out what dance you were doing,” says Martin. The suit contains steel wires that are so thin and lightweight that they feel and move like fabric, and the sensors can be removed so the suit can be washed. Such technology may eventually be used to make clothing that can be used to tell when a person is about to fall, or to monitor a person’s heart rate, blood pressure, temperature, and other statistics. The collected data would be sent to a computing device, possibly a home PC or mobile device, where it can be analyzed and monitored for potential health problems. Currently, the garments Martin and Jones are creating are not really suitable for wearing in public because the researchers are focusing on computer engineering more than aesthetics. However, the researchers have also designed a rug that lights up in different patterns when stepped on. “It’s a really good example of what I call working in the margins with computer engineering, textile design, and garment design,” Martin says. “You really have to pay attention to all three of them.”
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Computerizing Clothing at Tech
Collegiate Times (10/17/07) Oliver, Ashley
