Warp-Knitted Textile as a Strain Sensor: Characterization Procedure and Application in a Comfortable Wearable Goniometer

Long-term and minimally invasive joint angular measurements are required for monitoring everyday activities, motor rehabilitation sessions, and sport training. In this paper, we designed an innovative wearable device composed of a light, comfortable, and low-cost textile strain-resistance sensor. First, we proposed a methodology to characterize and to calibrate a commercial knitted textile. This characterization procedure represents an interesting result per se. It has been conducted on a single material, but its general characteristics make it suitable for analyzing the behavior of any conductive and stretchable fabrics. Second, we developed a wearable sensor (a goniometer) and we validated it using the humanoid robot SABIAN. Dynamic tests demonstrated that our wearable device is suitable for scenarios, where the accuracy of measurements is less relevant than the ability to continuously track joint movements in a not-obtrusive way.

[1]  Paolo Dario,et al.  Towards an Improvement of the SABIAN Humanoid Robot: from Design to Optimization , 2012 .

[2]  Kamiar Aminian,et al.  A new approach to accurate measurement of uniaxial joint angles based on a combination of accelerometers and gyroscopes , 2005, IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering.

[3]  Cédric Cochrane,et al.  Design and Development of a Flexible Strain Sensor for Textile Structures Based on a Conductive Polymer Composite , 2007, Sensors (Basel, Switzerland).

[4]  Lucy E. Dunne,et al.  Overlock-Stitched Stretch Sensors: Characterization and Effect of Fabric Property , 2013 .

[5]  Elia Palange,et al.  A New Flexible Optical Fiber Goniometer for Dynamic Angular Measurements: Application to Human Joint Movement Monitoring , 2008, IEEE Transactions on Instrumentation and Measurement.

[6]  Tien-Wei Shyr,et al.  A Textile-Based Wearable Sensing Device Designed for Monitoring the Flexion Angle of Elbow and Knee Movements , 2014, Sensors.

[7]  C. Laschi,et al.  Sensorization of continuum soft robots for reconstructing their spatial configuration , 2012, 2012 4th IEEE RAS & EMBS International Conference on Biomedical Robotics and Biomechatronics (BioRob).

[8]  L. V. Pieterson,et al.  Smart textiles: Challenges and opportunities , 2012 .

[9]  L. Castano,et al.  Smart fabric sensors and e-textile technologies: a review , 2014 .

[10]  C. Myles,et al.  Knee joint kinematics in gait and other functional activities measured using flexible electrogoniometry: how much knee motion is sufficient for normal daily life? , 2000, Gait & posture.

[11]  Robert J. Wood,et al.  Soft wearable motion sensing suit for lower limb biomechanics measurements , 2013, 2013 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation.

[12]  Li Guo,et al.  Textile Strain Sensors Characterization- Sensitivity, Linearity, Stability and Hysteresis , 2010 .

[13]  Alessandro Chiolerio,et al.  Wearable Electronics and Smart Textiles: A Critical Review , 2014, Sensors.

[14]  K. Hata,et al.  A stretchable carbon nanotube strain sensor for human-motion detection. , 2011, Nature nanotechnology.

[15]  D. Rossi,et al.  New generation of wearable goniometers for motion capture systems , 2014, Journal of NeuroEngineering and Rehabilitation.

[16]  Sang-Gook Kim,et al.  Extremely Elastic Wearable Carbon Nanotube Fiber Strain Sensor for Monitoring of Human Motion. , 2015, ACS nano.

[17]  Lucy E. Dunne,et al.  Theory and characterization of a top-thread coverstitched stretch sensor , 2012, 2012 IEEE International Conference on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics (SMC).

[18]  H. Harry Asada,et al.  Wearable conductive fiber sensors for measuring joint movements , 2004, IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, 2004. Proceedings. ICRA '04. 2004.

[19]  Tien-Wei Shyr,et al.  The Effect of Tensile Hysteresis and Contact Resistance on the Performance of Strain-Resistant Elastic-Conductive Webbing , 2011, Sensors.

[20]  Danilo De Rossi,et al.  Wearable technology for biomechanics: e-textile or micromechanical sensors? [Conversations in BME] , 2010, IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Magazine.

[21]  Robert J. Wood,et al.  Wearable soft sensing suit for human gait measurement , 2014, Int. J. Robotics Res..

[22]  Ozgur Atalay,et al.  Weft-Knitted Strain Sensor for Monitoring Respiratory Rate and Its Electro-Mechanical Modeling , 2015, IEEE Sensors Journal.

[23]  Dai Meng,et al.  Accuracy Improvement on the Measurement of Human-Joint Angles , 2016, IEEE Journal of Biomedical and Health Informatics.

[24]  I-Ming Chen,et al.  A low cost wearable optical-based goniometer for human joint monitoring , 2010 .

[25]  Massimo Totaro,et al.  Revealing bending and force in a soft body through a plant root inspired approach , 2015, Scientific Reports.

[26]  D. De Rossi,et al.  Wearable, redundant fabric-based sensor arrays for reconstruction of body segment posture , 2004, IEEE Sensors Journal.

[27]  Jürgen Kosel,et al.  Wearable Flexible Sensors: A Review , 2017, IEEE Sensors Journal.

[28]  Mitsunori Tada,et al.  Stretchable Strain Sensor With Anisotropy and Application for Joint Angle Measurement , 2016, IEEE Sensors Journal.

[29]  Peter H. Veltink,et al.  Measuring orientation of human body segments using miniature gyroscopes and accelerometers , 2005, Medical and Biological Engineering and Computing.

[30]  Mary M. Rodgers,et al.  Recent Advances in Wearable Sensors for Health Monitoring , 2015, IEEE Sensors Journal.

[31]  Bernard F. Morrey,et al.  The Elbow and Its Disorders , 2000 .

[32]  G. Tröster,et al.  Sensor for Measuring Strain in Textile , 2008, Sensors.