Soft Sensors and Textile Techniques

The project has two aspects: One is to experiment with textile production techniques to construct soft sensors, and the other is to contextualize these sensory materials by putting them into an interactive object. The research activity is part of the project “Design, Textiles and Sustainable Development” together with Anja Lund and Gauss Lee. In a first experiment, I knitted a glove with a simple stretch-sensitive material on the fingers which should later be replaced with a more sensitive piezo-electric fibre that Anja developed. The circuit in the glove is constructed  so that it requires minimal manual finishing to be attached to the sewn circuit.

A second example shows a pressure-sensitive knitted sensor. The knitted structure creates air cushions between two layers of knit that only make contact when pressed. The knit is not actually sensitive to the amount of pressure but rather serves as a very simple array of switches. Each horizontal line serves as an analog sensor. The structure is very easy to produce, does not require specific materials and can cover a large area.

Research by Katharina Bredies