Electrothermal Modeling and Analysis of Polypyrrole-Coated Wearable E-Textiles.

The inhomogeneity of the resistance of conducting polypyrrole-coated nylon-Lycra and polyester (PET) fabrics and its effects on surface temperature were investigated through a systematic experimental and numerical work including the optimization of coating conditions to determine the lowest resistivity conductive fabrics and establish a correlation between the fabrication conditions and the efficiency and uniformity of Joule heating in conductive textiles. For this purpose, the effects of plasma pre-treatment and molar concentration analysis of the dopant anthraquinone sulfonic acid (AQSA), oxidant ferric chloride, and monomer pyrrole was carried out to establish the conditions to determine the sample with the lowest electrical resistance for generating heat and model the experiments using the finite element modeling (FEM). Both PET and nylon-Lycra underwent atmospheric plasma treatment to functionalize the fabric surface to improve the binding of the polymer and obtain coatings with reduced resistance.