Networks of sensors, displays, and smart devices on the body offer powerful capabilities for continuously monitoring health and delivering personalized care. Wireless technologies are essential to interconnect sensors distributed around the body, but existing approaches have inherent limitations in energy loss and data security that limit the practical use of such networks. This talk will describe recent work on wirelessly functional textiles that interact with wireless technologies such as Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and near-field communication. Using the electronic textile toolkit, I show that clothing can be designed to transmit wireless signals between wearable devices, power battery-free sensors around the body, and sense changes in the wireless environment, all without any physical connection between clothing and electronics. I discuss applications of sensor networks based on such clothing for healthcare, athletics, and emergency personnel.
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