Production and characterization of Graphene Nanoplatelet-based ink for smart textile strain sensors via screen printing technique

Abstract Wearable systems are becoming highly attractive in different application areas. Recently, particular attention has been focused on the development of personal portable devices for monitoring occupational safety and health. Smart clothes based strain sensors integrated fabric seem to be a promising solution real-time measurement physiological endpoints. However, through simple cost-effective process smart textiles characterized by high sensitivity, wearability stable response even during physical activity, case exposition environmental conditions after washing is still challenging. In this work, authors have developed novel sensor made graphene nanoplatelets (GNPs) properly dispersed into water-based transparent ink, then deposited via screen printing technique synthetic fabric. Rheological investigations GNP-filled inks, morphological characterization coated fabrics, electrical measurements films obtained with GNPs concentrations were performed. textile specimens loaded 3%wt 3.8%wt GNP-based inks quasi-static tensile tests investigate electromechanical response, cycle. Specimens shown sensitivity about 30 5%. This performance interesting applications such as respiratory heart rates.