• Polymer(Korea)
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• v.24 no.5
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• pp.673-681
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• 2000

Electrically conductive composites have been prepared by treating fabrics with oxidizing agent and exposing them to aniline, which deposited a substantial amount of conductive polymer within the interstices of the material. However the conductivity of the composite fabrics was limited by the irregular deposition of the conductive polymer layer. To improve the conductivity of polyaniline/nylon 6 composite fabrics, we modified the surface characteristics of nylon 6 fabrics by various plasma treatments and increased diffusion and adsorption of aniline by ultrasonic treatments. By the oxygen plasma treatment, attachment of functional groups such as C-O and C-OH increased on the surface of nylon 6 fiber, which promoted adhesion to polyaniline resulting in the higher add-on and electrical conductivity. Electrical conductivities of polyaniline/nylon 6 composite fabrics were highly increased by ultrasonic treatment, which assisted the diffusion of aniline into the inside of nylon fabrics by cavitation and vibration. Also, the effects of monomer concentration and the number of deposition cycles on the nylon 6 fabric conductivity Were investigated. As a result, the fabric conductivity increased with the monomer concentration and the number of polymerization deposition cycles.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Clothing and Textiles
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• v.31 no.2 s.161
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• pp.292-299
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• 2007

Development of portable device measuring the vital sign continuously with no limit of time and space is absolutely prerequisite for the U-health care that grafts the ubiquitous concept into medical system. Accordingly, it requires to develop a garment style apparatus for measuring vital-sign that is easy to wear on for a long time period. This study suggests a method to improve the insulation of electric cable and the skin adhesion of electrode by integrating the electric conductive material to garment, in order to develop a garment apparatus for measuring ECG for U-health care. Results of the research are as follows; In order to provide the adjacent conductive yarns with insulation, braid with narrow woven end was interlaced using polyester yarn. As a result, the direct contact between electric conductive yarns was restrained, which would be interposed into pin-tuck structured cable. Washable silicone gel applied around the electrode made of electric conductive fabric improved the adhesion, which prevents electrodes from dropping off from the skin surface during body movement. ECG signals on the human subject were tested using the garment apparatus developed by the above method. And the result was that the clear QRS wave formation in the typical form of ECG could be measured in both conditions of still and moving state as well. The result of this study is expected to contribute for the production of U-health care related medical apparatus by accelerating the practical uses of the garment measuring vital sign at a reasonable price.

• Fashion & Textile Research Journal
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.138-145
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• 2022

Today, graphene loaded textiles are being considered promising smart clothing due to their high conductivity. In this study, we reported reduced graphene oxide(r-GO) deposited pure cotton fabrics fabricated with a colloidal solution of graphene(GO), using a one-step aerosol spray pyrolysis(ASP) process and their potential application on smart textiles. The ASP process is advantageous in that it is easily implementable and can be applied for continuous processing. Moreover, this process has never been applied to deposit r-GO on pure cotton fabric. The field emission-scanning microscopy (FE-SEM) observation, Fourier transform-infrared(FT-IR) analysis, Raman spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction(XRD) analysis, and ultraviolet transmittance(UVT) were used to evaluate material properties of the r-GO colloids. The resistance was also measured to evaluate the electrical conductivity of the specimens. The results revealed that the r-GO was successfully deposed on specimens, and the specimen with the highest electrical conductivity demonstrated an electrical resistance value of 2.27 kΩ/sq. Taken together, the results revealed that the ASP method demonstrated a high potential for effective deposition of r-GO on cotton fabric specimens and is a prospect for the development of conductive cotton-based smart clothing. Therefore, this study is also meaningful in that the ASP process can be newly applied by depositing r-GO on the pure cotton fabric.

• Composites Research
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• v.31 no.6
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• pp.355-364
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• 2018

Flexible energy-storage devices (FESDs) have been studied and developed extensively over the last few years because of demands in various fields. Since electrochemical performance and mechanical flexibility must be taken into account together, different framework from composition of conventional energy-storage devices (ESDs) is required. Numerous types of electrodes have been proposed to implement the FESDs. Herein, we review the works related to the FESDs so far and focus on free-standing electrodes and, especially substrate-based ones. The way to utilize carbon woven fabric (CF) or carbon cloth (CC) as flexible substrates is quite simple and intuitive. However, it is meaningful in the point of that the framework exploiting CF or CC can be extended to other applications resulting in multifunctional composites. Therefore, summary, which is on utilization of carbon-based material and conductive substrate containing CF and CC for ESDs, turns out to be helpful for other researchers to have crude concepts to get into energy-storage multi-functional composite. Moreover, polymer electrolytes are briefly explored as well because safety is one of the most important issues in FESDs and the electrolyte part mainly includes difficult obstacles to overcome. Lastly, we suggest some points that need to be further improved and studied for FESDs.

• Korean Chemical Engineering Research
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• v.58 no.3
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• pp.466-473
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• 2020

Fabric current collector can be a promising electrode material for Capacitive Deionization (CDI) system that can achieve energy-efficient desalination of water. The one of the most attractive feature of the fabric current collector is its high tensile strength, which can be an alternative to the low mechanical strength of the graphite foil electrode. Another advantage is that the textile properties can easily make shapes by simple cutting, and the porosity and inter-fiber space which can assist facile flow of the aqueous medium. The fibers used in this study were made of woven structures using a spinning yarn using conductive LM fiber and carbon fiber, with tensile strength of 319 MPa, about 60 times stronger than graphite foil. The results were analyzed by measuring the salt removal efficiency by changing the viscosity of electrode slurry, adsorption voltage, flow rate of the aqueous medium, and concentration of the aqueous medium. Under the conditions of NaCl 200 mg/L, 20ml/min and adsorption voltage 1.5 V, salt removal efficiency of 43.9% in unit cells and 59.8% in modules stacked with 100 cells were shown, respectively. In unit cells, salt removal efficiency increases as the adsorption voltage increase to 1.3, 1.4 and 1.5 V. However, increasing to 1.6 and 1.7 V reduced salt removal efficiency. However, the 100-cell-stacked module showed a moderate increase in salt removal efficiency even at voltages above 1.5 V. The salt removal rate decreased when the flow rate of the feed was increased, and the salt removal rate decreased when the concentration of the feed was increased. This work shows that fabric current collector can be an alternative of a graphite foil.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.27 no.6
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• pp.397-402
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• 2018

Proper seat design is critical to the safety, comfort, and ergonomics of automotive driver's seats. To ensure effective seat design, quantitative methods should be used to evaluate the characteristics of automotive seats. This paper presents a system that is capable of simultaneously monitoring body pressure distribution and surface deformation in a textile material. In this study, a textile-based capacitive sensor was used to detect the body pressure distribution in an automotive seat. In addition, a strain gauge sensor was used to detect the degree of curvature deformation due to high-pressure points. The textile-based capacitive sensor was fabricated from the conductive fabric and a polyurethane insulator with a high signal-to-noise ratio. The strain gauge sensor was attached on the guiding film to maximize the effect of its deformation due to bending. Ten pressure sensors were placed symmetrically in the hip area and six strain gauge sensors were distributed on both sides of the seat cushion. A readout circuit monitored the absolute and relative values from the sensors in realtime, and the results were displayed as a color map. Moreover, we verified the proposed system for quantifying the body pressure and fabric deformation by studying 18 participants who performed three predefined postures. The proposed system showed desirable results and is expected to improve seat safety and comfort when applied to the design of various seat types. Moreover, the proposed system will provide analytical criteria in the design and durability testing of automotive seats.

• International Journal of Aeronautical and Space Sciences
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.215-221
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• 2017

An electromagnetic (EM) wave absorber reduces the possibility of radar detection by minimizing the radar cross section (RCS) of structures. In this study, a radar absorbing structure (RAS) was applied to the leading edge of a blended wing body aircraft to reduce RCS in X-band (8.2~12.4GHz) radar. The RAS was composed of a periodic pattern resistive sheet with conductive lossy material and glass-fiber/epoxy composite as a spacer. The applied RAS is a multifunctional composite structure which has both electromagnetic (EM) wave absorbing ability and load-bearing ability. A two dimensional unit absorber was designed first in a flat-plate shape, and then the fabricated leading edge structure incorporating the above RAS was investigated, using simulated and free-space measured reflection loss data from the flat-plate absorber. The leading edge was implemented on the aircraft, and its RCS was measured with respect to various azimuth angles in both polarizations (VV and HH). The RCS reduction effect of the RAS was evaluated in comparison with a leading edge of carbon fabric reinforced plastics (CFRP). The designed leading edge structure was examined through static structural analysis for various aircraft load cases to check structural integrity in terms of margin of safety. The mechanical and structural characteristics of CFRP, RAS and CFRP with RAM structures were also discussed in terms of their weight.

• Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology
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• v.12 no.1
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• pp.317-328
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• 2017

This paper presents design and specific absorption rate analysis of a 2.4 GHz wearable patch antenna on a conventional and electromagnetic bandgap (EBG) ground planes, under normal and bent conditions. Wearable materials are used in the design of the antenna and EBG surfaces. A woven fabric (Zelt) is used as a conductive material and a 3 mm thicker Wash Cotton is used as a substrate. The dielectric constant and tangent loss of the substrate are 1.51 and 0.02 respectively. The volume of the proposed antenna is $113{\times}96.4{\times}3mm^3$. The metamaterial surface is used as a high impedance surface which shields the body from the hazards of electromagnetic radiations to reduce the Specific Absorption Rate (SAR). For on-body analysis a three layer model (containing skin, fats and muscles) of human arm is used. Antenna employing the EBG ground plane gives safe value of SAR (i.e. 1.77W/kg<2W/kg), when worn on human arm. This value is obtained using the safe limit of 2 W/kg, averaged over 10g of tissue, specified by the International Commission of Non Ionization Radiation Protection (ICNIRP). The SAR is reduced by 83.82 % as compare to the conventional antenna (8.16 W/kg>2W/kg). The efficiency of the EBG based antenna is improved from 52 to 74 %, relative to the conventional counterpart. The proposed antenna can be used in wearable electronics and smart clothing.

• Science of Emotion and Sensibility
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• v.20 no.2
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• pp.171-178
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• 2017

'Smart Sensibility Mat (SSM)' was developed and manufactured for positive sensibility of newborn with fiber, digital, and sensibility technology to reflect features and advantages of kangaroo care. For tactile stimuli, the tube of the silicon material to provide a constant temperature of $32^{\circ}C$ was inserted into the mat and connected to the water-thermostat. To provide a uniform temperature throughout the mat, the fabric by the inserting conductive yarn was attached to the mat surface. After wrapping the mat with cotton pad, the polyurethane foam used as medicine in order to similar to the human skin was bonded to the surface of the mat. To provide the auditory stimuli of a level of 30dB with mother's heartbeat sounds and voice recorded in advance, the Bluetooth speaker was inserted into the mat. To investigate the effects of SSM, 10 newborns who born within two weeks were involved in this experiment. While the baby was lying on each of the general mat (GM) and SSM, the baby's physiological signals-heart rate, breathing rate, temperature- were measured and then, those were conducted t-test to examine the difference between the signals of SSM and GM. The results were as follows: heart rate (t=8.131, p<.001) and respiratory rate (t=7.227, p<.001) among the physiological signals of SSM decreased significantly than GM within the normal range. Temperature (t=1.062, p=0.292) at SSM showed a tendency to decrease than GM within the normal range. This means the tactile stimuli and the auditory stimuli providing from SSM give stable physiological responses. Thus, SSM leads to have psychological comfort and stability of newborns.