MIT’s Smart Clothes measure movements and poses

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has designed clothing which use special fibres to sense movement of person via touch.

Highlights

Researchers from MIT also showed their clothes determined things such as if the person is sitting, walking, or doing any particular pose. Group from MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab (CSAIL) highlighted, their clothes can be used for athletic training and rehabilitation. These clothes can even help in monitoring health of residents in assisted-care facilities, with the permission of patients, and can determine things like- if the person has fallen or is unconscious.  

What researchers have developed?

Researchers have developed prototypes ranging from socks and gloves to a full vest. It uses a mix of more typical textile fibres and a small amount of custom-made functional fibers which can sense pressure from person wearing the cloth. Socks predict motion by examining different sequences of tactile footprints related to different poses when user transitions from one to another pose. Similarly, full-sized vest can determine wearers’ pose, activity and texture of contracted surfaces.

Significance of development

Unlike existing wearable electronics, smart cloth can be incorporated into traditional large-scale clothing production. These machine-knitted tactile textiles are soft, breathable, stretchable and can any forms.


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