Knitted Fabrics Made from Highly Conductive Stretchable Fibers

Abstract

We report knitted fabrics made from highly conductive stretchable fibers. The maximum initial conductivity of fibers synthesized by wet spinning was 17460 S cm-1 with a rupture tensile strain of 50%. The maximum strain could be increased to 490% by decreasing the conductivity to 236 S cm -1. The knitted fabric was mechanically and electrically reversible up to 100% tensile strain when coated by poly(dimethylsiloxane). The normalized resistance of the poly(dimethylsiloxane)-coated fabric decreased to 0.65 at 100% strain. © 2014 American Chemical Society.