Across China: Chinese researchers develop new luminous smart fiber

A researcher shows the luminous mechanism of new smart fiber at Donghua University in Shanghai, east China, in March 2024. (Donghua University/Handout via Xinhua)

SHANGHAI, April 7 (Xinhua) -- A Chinese research team has developed a new type of smart fiber that can emit light and generate electricity without being plugged in.

The fiber integrates functions including wireless energy collection, information perception and transmission, and can be made into textiles that can realize human-computer interaction functions such as luminous display and touch control without chips and batteries.

The study, recently published in the journal Science, is expected to change the way people interact with the environment and between people, and is of great significance for the application of smart textiles.

Smart wearable devices have become part of daily life and play an important role in health monitoring, telemedicine, human-computer interaction and other fields.

Compared with traditional rigid semiconductor components or flexible thin film devices, electronic textiles made of smart fibers are more breathable and softer.

However, the current development of smart fibers uses complex multi-module integration, which increases the volume, weight and rigidity of textiles.

A research team from Donghua University's College of Materials Science and Engineering accidentally discovered that fibers emitted light in a radio field during an experiment.

Based on the findings, the team developed a new type of smart fiber that uses electromagnetic energy as a wireless driving force.

This new type of fiber is featured with cost-effective raw materials and mature processing technology, said Yang Weifeng, a member of the research team.

It can realize fabric display, wireless instruction transmission and other functions without using chips and batteries.

Clothes made of the new fibers can be interactive and luminous, and can also remotely control electronic products wirelessly by generating unique signals for different postures of users, said Hou Chengyi, a researcher at Donghua University.

The research team said that they will further study how to make the new fiber collect energy from space more effectively to develop more functions including display, deformation, and computing. ■