Functional electronic textiles for light emitting and colour changing applications

智能织物或电子纺织品（e-textiles）涉及将电子功能添加到标准纺织品中。纺织品是一种无处不在的材料，有多种形式，应用范围很广，从服装到技术纺织品，例如创意产业和医学。该提案涉及在纺织品上制造发光膜及其应用，以通过研究电子功能油墨并使用喷涂、喷墨和丝网印刷来实现纺织品显示和变色织物。纺织品由于其粗糙的表面拓扑结构、孔隙率以及它们对加工温度的限制而成为设备印刷的要求苛刻的基材。合适的功能材料沿着可靠、一致的制造工艺的实现将对纺织、服装和创意产业产生巨大影响。通过选择性照明和颜色变化控制纺织品外观的能力将使电子纺织品的能力发生阶跃变化，从而增加价值、功能和产品差异化。特别是，该研究计划将研究在可见光和紫外线波长下工作的纺织品有机发光电化学电池（OLECs）的制造。OLECs具有在空气中电化学稳定的吸引力，需要低的开启电压（~3V），并且表现出高亮度水平（>800 cd/m2），允许它们在日常照明中清晰可见。OLEC结构仅需要单个功能层，这使得与例如OLED相比，其制造相对简单。选择性地发射不同波长的光的能力将在电子纺织品能力上产生阶跃变化。可见波长OLECs可用于在纺织品上产生可变的、可控的发光图案，其可用于高可见度服装或时尚应用中。紫外线波长OLECs将使纺织品能够进行紫外线杀菌照射（UVGI），这是一种使用222或254 nm的短波长UVC光的消毒方法。基于纺织品的UVGI可以被纳入医疗应用中，如智能绷带，以治疗/预防感染并减少对抗生素的依赖。UV-OLEC还可以与额外的印刷光致变色层组合，以实现非发光变色纺织品。当暴露于紫外光时，光致变色材料从透明变为不透明，这可以产生显着的颜色变化。这种方法可以控制纺织品的外观，而不发光或要求OLEC连续打开。研究将包括定制设计的增强型有机分子的配方，与现有技术相比，其发光效率更高。这些将被配制成可印刷材料，并与可印刷导电材料结合。还将探索设备架构和制造工艺（喷涂，喷墨和丝网印刷）。该研究将解决关键的加工挑战，以便在纺织品上实现可靠和坚固的薄膜和器件。

Smart fabrics, or electronic-textiles (e-textiles), concern the addition of electronic functionality to standard textiles. Textiles are a ubiquitous material available in many forms and used in a huge range of applications from clothing to technical textiles that are applied in, for example, creative industries and medicine. This proposal addresses the fabrication of light emitting films on textiles and their application to achieve textile displays and colour-changing fabrics through research into electronically functional inks and using spray coating, inkjet and screen printing. Textiles are demanding substrates for device printing due to their rough surface topology, porosity and the constraints they impose on processing temperatures. The achievement of suitable functional materials along with reliable, consistent fabrication processes will have a huge impact in the textile, garment and creative industries. The ability to control the appearance of textiles through selective illumination and colour change will produce a step change in e-textile capability that will add value, function and product differentiation. In particular, this programme of research will investigate the fabrication of textile organic light emitting electrochemical cells (OLECs) operating at visible and UV wavelengths. OLECs have the attractions of being electrochemically stable in air, require a low turn on voltage (~3V) and demonstrate a high luminance level (>800 cd/m2) allowing them to be clearly visible in everyday lighting. The OLEC structure requires only a single functional layer which makes it relatively straightforward to fabricate compared to, for example, OLED's. The ability to selectively emit different wavelengths of light will produce a step change in e-textile capability. Visible wavelength OLECs can be used to produce variable, controllable, light emitting patterns on the textile, which can be used in high visibility clothing or fashion applications. UV wavelength OLECs will enable a textile to perform ultraviolet germicidal irradiation (UVGI), which is a disinfection method that uses short wavelength UVC light at 222 or 254 nm. Textile based UVGI can be incorporated into medical applications such as smart bandages to treat/prevent infection and reduce reliance on antibiotics. UV-OLECs can also be combined with additional printed photochromic layers to realise non-light emitting colour changing textiles. When exposed to UV light, photochromic materials change from transparent to opaque and this can produce significant changes in colour. This approach can control the textile appearance without emitting light or requiring the OLEC to be continuously switched onThe research will include the formulation of custom designed enhanced organic molecules with enhanced emission efficiency compared to the state of the art. These will be formulated into printable materials and combined with printable conductive materials. Device architectures and fabrication processes (spray coating, inkjet and screen printing) will also be explored. The research will address the key processing challenges in order to realise reliable and robust thin films and devices on textiles.