Gold nanoparticle treated textile-based materials for potential use as wearable sensors

Wearable sensors for monitoring and clinical applications for non-hospital-based healthcare has the potential to significantly reduce healthcare costs and permit individuals to maintain an independent lifestyle free of the constraints imposed by hospital-based care. Wearable, small chemical sensors have the potential to deliver a wide range of reliable on body monitoring systems for personal monitoring and detecting chemicals in the environment. The present work investigates the potential of using widely available commercial fabric materials as chemical sensors. Various fabrics including natural, synthetics and blends of both natural and synthetic were treated with gold nanoparticle solutions to determine the treatments effectiveness in changing a materials electrical resistance. The studies found treating the fabrics reduced the materials resistive characteristics. The study also found that treated natural silk fabrics could also be used to detect ethanol vapour. Thus, making treated silk fabrics a potential chemical sensor.