Design considerations for the creation of electronic yarns for wearable health monitoring devices

Textiles with embedded sensing capabilities can be an ideal solution for many health monitoring applications as textiles are comfortable to wear close to the skin. Various integration techniques have been explored over the years to create textiles and garments with electronic functionality. One method is to embed electronics within the core of a yarn that is then used to produce textiles. The method discussed in this work accomplishes this by soldering a component onto conductive wires, encapsulating them within a discrete resin pod, and then covering the wires and component in a fibre sheath. This electronic yarn can be incorporated into textiles to produce wearable garments. This technology has already been used to create a variety of textiles with different functions. The literature has shown limitations with the existing electronic yarn design, and this work discusses how these limitations can be overcome.