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Applications of Smart Sensing Textiles for Assessment and Assistance of Motion

A special issue of Sensors (ISSN 1424-8220). This special issue belongs to the section "Biomedical Sensors".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 15 March 2025 | Viewed by 3466

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Joana Figueiredo

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Center for MicroElectroMechanical Systems (CMEMS), University of Minho, 4710-057 Braga, Portuga
Interests: neurorehabilitation robotics; human–robot interaction; motion control; wearable sensors; smart textiles; motion analysis and recognition
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Cristina P. Santos

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Center for MicroElectroMechanical Systems (CMEMS), University of Minho, 4710-057 Braga, Portugal
Interests: human motion; human locomotion; human–robot interactions and collaboration; medical devices; neuro-rehabilitation of patients suffering from motor problems by means of bio-inspired robotics and neuroscience technologies
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Wearable technology is an emerging trend that can be worn on any part of the body to address challenges in our lifestyles, particularly for the monitoring, assessment, and assistance of motion. The breakthrough potential of wearable technology for continuous monitoring and assistance spans various fields, such as healthcare, well-being, professional and amateur sports, occupational health and ergonomics, space, and defense. Among the available wearable technologies, smart textiles, smart clothes, and smart garments have gained attention for two primary reasons: (1) textiles are essential in everyday life due to their lightness, durability, ease of use, and flexibility; (2) textiles-based technology exhibits minimal-to-no obtrusive effects, preserving the user’s natural agility and achieving higher user acceptance rates.

The most advanced applications can be found in the area of motion assessment through smart sensing garments integrated with dry electrodes, conductive yarns, stretchable or resistive sensors, and 3D-printed sensing structures. Here, the key challenge is to achieve high-quality and repetitive sensing in flexible textiles.

Prominent examples also include smart materials with actuation characteristics such as materials with shape memory alloy effects, applied as personal protective or augmentative equipment. Challenges in this area include generating sufficient force for human assistance and augmentation, and developing multi-functional clothing systems that combine both sensing and actuation elements.

The purpose of this Special Issue is to publish high-quality research articles and reviews that address the challenges mentioned above. We encourage submissions that describe experimental and theoretical methods to address recent achievements in the development of novel smart textile systems, as well as their potential applications.

Dr. Joana Figueiredo
Dr. Cristina P. Santos
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sensors is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • wearable sensors
  • smart textiles
  • flexible sensors
  • smart actuators
  • human monitoring
  • motion assistance
  • sports analytics
  • healthcare
  • ergonomics

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Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

15 pages, 7377 KiB  
Article
Flat-Knitted Double-Tube Structure Capacitive Pressure Sensors Integrated into Fingertips of Fully Fashioned Glove Intended for Therapeutic Use
by Susanne Fischer, Carola Böhmer, Shamima Nasrin, Carmen Sachse and Chokri Cherif
Sensors 2024, 24(23), 7500; https://doi.org/10.3390/s24237500 - 25 Nov 2024
Viewed by 320
Abstract
A therapeutic glove, which enables medical non-professionals to perform physiotherapeutic gripping and holding movements on patients, would significantly improve the healthcare situation in physiotherapy. The glove aims to detect the orthogonal pressure load and provide feedback to the user. The use of textile [...] Read more.
A therapeutic glove, which enables medical non-professionals to perform physiotherapeutic gripping and holding movements on patients, would significantly improve the healthcare situation in physiotherapy. The glove aims to detect the orthogonal pressure load and provide feedback to the user. The use of textile materials for the glove assures comfort and a good fit for the user. This, in turn, implies a textile realization of the sensor system in order to manufacture both the glove and the sensor system in as few process steps as possible, using only one textile manufacturing technique. The flat knitting technology is an obvious choice here. The aim of the study is to develop a textile capacitive pressure sensor that can be integrated into the fingertips of a glove using flat knitting technology and to evaluate its sensor properties with regard to transmission behavior, hysteresis and drift. It was shown that the proposed method of a flat knitting sensor fabrication is suitable for producing both the sensors and the glove in one single process step. In addition, the implementation of an entire glove with integrated pressure sensors, including the necessary electrical connection of the sensor electrodes via knitted conductive paths in three fingers, was successfully demonstrated. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Applications of Smart Sensing Textiles for Assessment and Assistance of Motion)
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29 pages, 22874 KiB  
Article
Integrating sEMG and IMU Sensors in an e-Textile Smart Vest for Forward Posture Monitoring: First Steps
by João Martins, Sara M. Cerqueira, André Whiteman Catarino, Alexandre Ferreira da Silva, Ana M. Rocha, Jorge Vale, Miguel Ângelo and Cristina P. Santos
Sensors 2024, 24(14), 4717; https://doi.org/10.3390/s24144717 - 20 Jul 2024
Viewed by 1585
Abstract
Currently, the market for wearable devices is expanding, with a growing trend towards the use of these devices for continuous-monitoring applications. Among these, real-time posture monitoring and assessment stands out as a crucial application given the rising prevalence of conditions like forward head [...] Read more.
Currently, the market for wearable devices is expanding, with a growing trend towards the use of these devices for continuous-monitoring applications. Among these, real-time posture monitoring and assessment stands out as a crucial application given the rising prevalence of conditions like forward head posture (FHP). This paper proposes a wearable device that combines the acquisition of electromyographic signals from the cervical region with inertial data from inertial measurement units (IMUs) to assess the occurrence of FHP. To improve electronics integration and wearability, e-textiles are explored for the development of surface electrodes and conductive tracks that connect the different electronic modules. Tensile strength and abrasion tests of 22 samples consisting of textile electrodes and conductive tracks produced with three fiber types (two from Shieldex and one from Imbut) were conducted. Imbut’s Elitex fiber outperformed Shieldex’s fibers in both tests. The developed surface electromyography (sEMG) acquisition hardware and textile electrodes were also tested and benchmarked against an electromyography (EMG) gold standard in dynamic and isometric conditions, with results showing slightly better root mean square error (RMSE) values (for 4 × 2 textile electrodes (10.02%) in comparison to commercial Ag/AgCl electrodes (11.11%). The posture monitoring module was also validated in terms of joint angle estimation and presented an overall error of 4.77° for a controlled angular velocity of 40°/s as benchmarked against a UR10 robotic arm. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Applications of Smart Sensing Textiles for Assessment and Assistance of Motion)
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18 pages, 4241 KiB  
Article
Human-in-the-Loop Optimization of Knee Exoskeleton Assistance for Minimizing User’s Metabolic and Muscular Effort
by Sara Monteiro, Joana Figueiredo, Pedro Fonseca, J. Paulo Vilas-Boas and Cristina P. Santos
Sensors 2024, 24(11), 3305; https://doi.org/10.3390/s24113305 - 22 May 2024
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1096
Abstract
Lower limb exoskeletons have the potential to mitigate work-related musculoskeletal disorders; however, they often lack user-oriented control strategies. Human-in-the-loop (HITL) controls adapt an exoskeleton’s assistance in real time, to optimize the user–exoskeleton interaction. This study presents a HITL control for a knee exoskeleton [...] Read more.
Lower limb exoskeletons have the potential to mitigate work-related musculoskeletal disorders; however, they often lack user-oriented control strategies. Human-in-the-loop (HITL) controls adapt an exoskeleton’s assistance in real time, to optimize the user–exoskeleton interaction. This study presents a HITL control for a knee exoskeleton using a CMA-ES algorithm to minimize the users’ physical effort, a parameter innovatively evaluated using the interaction torque with the exoskeleton (a muscular effort indicator) and metabolic cost. This work innovates by estimating the user’s metabolic cost within the HITL control through a machine-learning model. The regression model estimated the metabolic cost, in real time, with a root mean squared error of 0.66 W/kg and mean absolute percentage error of 26% (n = 5), making faster (10 s) and less noisy estimations than a respirometer (K5, Cosmed). The HITL reduced the user’s metabolic cost by 7.3% and 5.9% compared to the zero-torque and no-device conditions, respectively, and reduced the interaction torque by 32.3% compared to a zero-torque control (n = 1). The developed HITL control surpassed a non-exoskeleton and zero-torque condition regarding the user’s physical effort, even for a task such as slow walking. Furthermore, the user-specific control had a lower metabolic cost than the non-user-specific assistance. This proof-of-concept demonstrated the potential of HITL controls in assisted walking. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Applications of Smart Sensing Textiles for Assessment and Assistance of Motion)
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