Fiber to see, talk and listen

Clothing that can see, hear and speak, is being developed by scientists at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT.

By adding light and strong material-sensitive synthetic fibers, researchers are creating a new class of intelligent materials that can have a large number of potential applications, such as undetectable microphones to sophisticated medical sensors.

"Fibers are, for the most part, static," said Yoel Fink, an MIT scientist and coauthor of natural materials.

Cotton, polyester, wool and other materials out good and comfortable, but all are 'dumb'. "We want to see how we can sofistikohet a thread and that can be done with many different functions, depending on the function that we will give," said Fink

Yoel Fink

Key to the fibers Fink is a special production process, similar to how the fiber build lajkes the sea, a marine plant.

To create fibers with sound, the scientists produced a graphite rod electrode, a piezoelectric plastic that usually found in microphones and light sensitive materials.

MIT scientists of these elektoda heat until they extend for miles, thin, except for their size, are identical with the original strings.

Here's the trick (twisted string): usually, during the heat of these materials involved, and fiber layers separated value and useless.

Yoel Fink and his colleagues have created a unique way to extend the fibers without destroying the architecture and its basic structure.

This is a simple procedure, but that has enabled Fink-un, to create an increasingly wider class of fibers with new and unique skills.

"He is more distance with this discovery, - said Eli Yablonovitch, Berkeley, a scientist at the University of California, in a newspaper.

"Yoel is a very creative guy, and this study is consistent with what he has achieved .."

Last year, Fink and his colleagues used this technique to create fibers that can see.

By incorporating piezoelectric material in the fiber, it has created a fiber that can hear and speak as well as shohi.Gama such applications to be integrated fiber is very large.

U.S. military has already tested such materials to light, sensitive as a means of communication between soldiers, Fink said in an interview last year. Fink stated that the study was funded by DARPA in the MIT Institute for Military Nanotechnologjine